A man who refused to move from a plane seat he had paid extra for shared details of the encounter, with people online backing his decision
The man and his partner refused to switch seats with the elderly couple (stock photo)(Image: Getty Images)
Taking a long-haul flight can be deeply uncomfortable, but securing a decent seat has the power to transform the entire journey.
For those unable to afford the indulgence of first class, extra legroom in economy is arguably the closest alternative.
After shelling out extra cash for additional legroom on a gruelling 12-hour flight, one man stood his ground and refused to swap seats for an elderly couple who attempted to claim his spot.
Sharing his experience on popular forum Reddit, the man admitted he endured dirty looks from fellow passengers after declining to budge from the seat he’d paid for.
Titling the post, the Reddit user wrote: “Old couple try to take our seats on a plane.”
The man detailed: “Saw a few plane seat-related posts so I thought I would add my story.
“A few years ago my significant other and I planned a three-month trip around the world. Our first flight was from New Zealand-LA. 12-13 hours.”
“We booked and paid for our flights and I added the premium economy seats as I’m 6’3 and wanted the extra legroom. Cost an extra $60 (£50).
“This flight was with Air New Zealand, the screen has your name on it when you get to your seat.
“We get on the plane. Find our seats and there is this older couple sitting there (mid 70s). I ask them if they got confused with their seat numbers. They hadn’t.
“I show them my ticket and seat number and point to my name on the screen. They then ask me just sit in their seats which were ten rows back. No leg room.”
After the elderly pair refused to budge from the seats, the man insisted they return to their allocated places as he had “paid extra”.
The man eplained the exchange: “Me: You want me to sit in your seats?”.
“OP(old people): Yes, that would be nice thank you.
“Me: I paid extra for these seats and would like to sit in them. Please move to your seats.
“OP: Oh, it’s not that bad there’s plenty of legroom.
“Me: Yeah, there’s plenty of legroom in my seats because I paid for it. I’ll help move your bag if you need.”
During their discussion, a flight attendant intervened to find out what was happening as a lengthy queue had formed down the aisle.
The exchange continued: “OP: This man wants us to move seats!”.
“Flight attendant: Sir, please go to your allocated seats.
“Me: Here is my ticket, these people are sitting in my seats. I paid extra because I need the legroom.
“FA to old people: Excuse me, you will have to move to your own seats as you have not paid for these seats.
“Old people: Well, can we please have an upgrade?”.
“FA: Sorry, this is a full flight so that’s not possible.”
The man said: “I got some stink eyes from other people on the flight. I paid for the extra legroom and I need it.”
Taking to the comments section, Reddit users weighed in on the contentious incident.
One said: “I have no idea why the other people who paid extra for legroom would glare at this guy.”
Meanwhile, another person added: “This isn’t a two hour flight where you buck up for the good of old people, which is still not right given the social experience that is flying – I wouldn’t care if it was a two hour flight there is still the principle of the matter, but I may cave depending on my mood.”
They said: “12-13 hours is no joke though – there is no giving in. You move those people or the plane doesn’t take off!”.
Crystal Palace striker Jean-Philippe Mateta’s move to AC Milan has been called off because of issues with his medical.
But Palace are still set to sign Wolves forward Jorgen Strand Larsen in a £48m deal before Monday’s 19:00 GMT transfer deadline.
France forward Mateta, who has been nursing a knee issue, had an initial medical examination on Sunday followed by additional tests on Monday.
The Italian club have now pulled out of the £30m deal for the 28-year-old, who wants to leave Selhurst Park.
Palace had been unwilling to let him go without having a replacement, but agreed a deal for Strand Larsen and granted Mateta permission to have an initial medical in London before flying to Milan.
Nottingham Forest have also been interested in the striker and had a £35m bid rejected by Palace last weekend.
After the 1-1 draw at Forest on Sunday, Palace manager Oliver Glasner said: “I expect either Mateta or someone else here as a striker.
“Everybody is really working very hard, but it is so close to the end of the window, so it makes it more difficult. I always try to be positive, so I hope.
“Worst case, we sell Mateta and no-one comes in, then it’s not a good window for Palace.”
Iran has announced that it now considers all European Union militaries to be ‘terrorist groups’. This follows the EU’s terror designation of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) over a deadly crackdown on protesters.
Move comes after a European Union decision to label the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps a ‘terrorist organisation’.
Published On 1 Feb 20261 Feb 2026
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Iran has declared European armies “terrorist groups” after a European Union decision to apply the same designation to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) over a bloody crackdown on recent protests.
Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf said on Sunday the decision was made under “Article 7 of the Law on Countermeasures Against the Declaration of the IRGC as a Terrorist Organisation”.
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“Europeans have in fact shot themselves in the foot and, once again, through blind obedience to the Americans, decided against the interests of their own people,” Ghalibaf said.
EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas announced the bloc’s designation of the IRGC on Thursday, saying repression could not “go unanswered”.
“Any regime that kills thousands of its own people is working toward its own demise,” she wrote on social media.
The United States-based Human Rights Activists News Agency says it has confirmed 6,713 deaths during the nationwide protests that began on December 28 over economic grievances but soon evolved into a serious challenge to the government.
Iranian authorities have not announced any official arrest numbers, but said at least 3,117 people were killed during the protests, including 2,427 described as “innocent” protesters or security forces.
Internet and mobile access were cut off by the state across Iran on the night of January 8, during the height of the protests.
The IRGC is a branch of Iran’s military, established after the 1979 Iranian revolution. Operating alongside the regular armed forces, it answers directly to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and plays a central role in Iran’s defence, foreign operations, and regional influence.
Iran’s retaliatory move came amid weeks of rising tensions, with US President Donald Trump repeatedly threatening military strikes and building up its naval presence in the Middle East. Trump, however, said on Saturday that Iran was “seriously talking” with the US, hours after Iran’s top national security official said arrangements for negotiations were progressing.
Iranian officials have warned that any attack would draw a “comprehensive” response. Tehran has also planned a live-fire military drill for Sunday and Monday in the strategic Strait of Hormuz, the narrow mouth of the Gulf through which a fifth of all oil traded passes.
Meanwhile, the country’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on Sunday said if the US attacked Iran, it would become a regional conflict.
“[Trump] regularly says that he brought ships […] The Iranian nation shall not be scared by these things, the Iranian people will not be stirred by these threats,” Khamenei said.
“We are not the initiators and do not want to attack any country, but the Iranian nation will strike a strong blow against anyone who attacks and harasses them.”
Sloth is yet to be unmasked on The Masked Singer but one costume designer has revealed how the mystery star ‘almost scared’ the production team backstage on the hit show
23:05, 31 Jan 2026Updated 23:05, 31 Jan 2026
Sloth has made it through to the semi-final of The Masked Singer(Image: ITV)
The Masked Singer’s Sloth has been entertaining audiences for weeks on the hit ITVcompetition series after belting out a string of pop songs but no one is aware of just who is in the costume yet. The secret star is through to the semi-final, but it has emerged now that the performer was so “athletic” backstage, there were concerns raised in the costume department.
Costume designer Tim Simpson, creative director at Plunge Creations, insisted that the line up are always enthusiastic but explained that if they are too energetic, it can be hard on the elaborate outfits that are crafted for the series.
He said: “These performers are really up for it, and they really enjoy it. They’ve seen it enough times to realise that, and probably the word has gone out in the grapevine that if you’re going to get involved in The Masked Singer, then you’re gonna have to really strap in and get fit.‘
“So the word’s gone out, and by the time they arrive on set, or by the time we get to the costumes to them, I think they’re already quite into it.
Speaking to Metro, Tim added: “Sloth, who apparently not just enjoyed the costume, but got to the point where it nearly scared the production team, because they were so physical and so athletic and so keen to be doing yoga and aerobics that we worried for the safety of the costume. The more the performers jump around, the better they look, but the harder it is on the costume.”
Judges Davina McCall, Mo Gilligan, Jonathan Ross and Maya Jama have already thrown a lot of names about as to who could be Sloth, with stars like fitness guru Joe Wicks, TV chef Jamie Oliver, Good Morning Britain’s Ed Balls, Chris Moyles, and Ben Fogle having been thrown into the mix.
So far, stars like Sex Pistols rocker John Lydon, rapper Professor Green and, singer Kate Nash and Strictly Come Dancing judge Anton Du Beke have been unmasked. On Saturday night’s edition of the show, former TV Burp star Harry Hill was revealed to have been performing as Red Panda.
Asked if he enjoyed it, he admitted: “No. Yes of course I enjoyed it! The weird thing is, you put the thing on and you’ve got no inhibitions. The only downside is you’re breathing your own breath because it’s all trapped, and I had falafel for lunch!”
Harry, who has been married to artist Magda Archer since 1996, then revealed after his elimination that it was his wife who inspired him to sign up for the show in the first place.
He said: “I always say to my wife what shall I do? And she said darling you should do it. That’s a holiday! I have just finished a big tour and I was planning to have some time off.
“You have to spend a bit of time learning the words but because you’re in the outfit, you don’t have to spend time thinking about a fancy dance routine or what faces you’re going to pull because it’s all inside [the costume].”
The Masked Singer continues Saturday at 7pm on ITV1 and ITV
A Los Angeles County judge ruled Wednesday that a corruption case against L.A. City Councilman Curren Price can move forward to trial, ensuring the misconduct scandal will hang over the veteran politician’s final year in office.
L.A. County Superior Court Judge Shelly Torrealba determined that prosecutors had provided enough evidence to move forward on four counts of voting on matters in which Price had a conflict of interest, four counts of embezzlement and four counts of perjury.
Price, who is set to leave the City Council after reaching his term limit at the end of the year, declined to comment after the hearing.
The councilman, who has represented South L.A. for more than a decade, was charged in June 2023. Prosecutors allege Price repeatedly voted to approve sales of land to developers or funding for agencies who had done business with his wife, Del Richardson, and her consulting company. Some of the votes involved funding and grants for the L.A. County Metropolitan Transportation Authority and the city housing authority.
Price, 75, is also accused of perjury for failing to include Richardson’s income on disclosure forms and embezzlement for including her on his city health insurance plan before they were legally married. He is due back in court in March, Torrealba said.
Richardson was named as a “suspect” in the district attorney’s office’s initial investigation in 2022, according to documents made public last year, but she was never charged with a crime. She has been among a group of Price’s supporters who have been in court for the past week. The two wore matching burgundy suits during Wednesday’s hearing.
Much of the weeklong proceeding centered around whether Price knew of potential conflicts of interest before casting votes, or intended to hide his financial stakes in them from the public. Delphi Smith, a former staffer for the councilman, and Price’s deputy chief of staff Maritza Alcaraz took the stand to explain the process they used to flag problematic council votes for Price and insisted they made their best efforts to highlight agenda items linked to vendors or agencies who had worked with Richardson.
“If the Councilman voted on something that was a potential conflict, he did so without knowing,” Alcaraz testified Wednesday.
L.A. County Deputy Dist. Atty. Casey Higgins, however, said Price is ultimately responsible for disclosing conflicts of interest and argued blaming his subordinates was not a defense to corruption charges.
“It’s not only hiding. It’s trying to create a wall around himself, to create this plausible deniability,” Higgins said. “It’s this ostrich with his head in the sand approach.”
Higgins said Alcaraz and Smith were “trying to jump in front of the bus” and that it was impossible to believe that Price had no knowledge of the conflicts. The dealings allegedly took place between 2019 and 2021 — after a 2019 Times investigation revealed he voted on decisions involving at least 10 companies in the same years they were listed as providing at least $10,000 in income to Richardson’s firm.
Price’s defense attorney, Michael Schafler, has argued there is no evidence that Price knew of the conflicts, and claimed payments to Richardson had no influence on Price’s voting decisions. All of the votes referenced in the criminal complaint passed with overwhelming support, and Price’s vote made no difference in the final result.
“There’s been no evidence presented that Mr. Price acted with any wrongful intent. No testimony from any witness … who said Mr. Price acted with willful intent,” Schafler said Wednesday. “I’ve never seen a public corruption case like that in my life.”
There were enormous sums of money on the line in each vote referenced in the criminal complaint. Richardson took in more than a half-million from October 2019 to June 2020 from the city housing authority before Price voted in favor of millions in grant funding for the agency, according to an amended complaint filed against Price last year.
Prosecutors also alleged Price wrote a motion to give $30 million to the L.A. County Metropolitan Transportation Authority during a time frame when Richardson was paid upward of $200,000 by the agency.
After Torrealba’s ruling, Schafler said he was “disappointed” but thought the evidence presented over the past week revealed that “the prosecution’s case has a lot of gaps, a lot of holes, it’s based largely on speculation.”
Some of Price’s City Council colleagues have said Price’s alleged crimes were tantamount to paperwork errors, and should have been handled by the city’s Ethics Commission.
While questioning former employees of Price and Richardson, Higgins sought to paint a more nefarious picture. He repeatedly scrutinized the way that Price’s staff and a former employee of Del Richardson & Associates compiled a list of the firm’s projects that could represent conflicts and communicated about them.
Much of the conflict information was placed on a flash drive and given to Smith in person by Martisa Garcia, an employee of Richardson, Higgins said. Updates to the file were then made over the phone, and not discussed via e-mail, according to Higgins. When Smith and Alcaraz discussed votes in which Price might have to recuse himself, they did so on personal phones rather than city-issued devices, according to evidence Higgins put forth.
Higgins suggested Price’s staff was trying to hide the conflicts of interest.
“Was the thumb drive used to avoid public records requests?” Higgins asked Alcaraz, who curtly replied “No.”
Generally speaking, California Public Records Act requests for an elected official’s communications will only capture what is contained on government devices, not personal phones or e-mails. A spokeswoman for Price, Angelina Valenica, said there was no “intent to avoid PRA requirements” on the part of Price’s staff.
“The Councilmember was not involved in the handling, transport or storage of this information,” she said. “He relied on and trusted his staff to handle the matter appropriately and to seek guidance as necessary.”
While it’s unlikely Price will stand trial before his term runs out, the case could loom large over the race to replace him. A field of seven candidates is running for his council seat, including Price’s deputy chief of staff, Jose Ugarte, who has faced allegations that he failed to disclose consulting income that are similar to the basis of the perjury charges against his boss.
Chris Martin, a candidate and civil rights attorney with Black Lives Matter Los Angeles, said Wednesday that if the allegations are true, Price and his staff need to step down.
“It’s a serious breach of public trust. It’s important that we have leaders in the 9th District who will walk with integrity,” Martin said. “It also seems like he’s got a major issue with his staff enabling him. They should all resign.”
Before arriving at CBS News in October to become editor in chief, Bari Weiss had never been inside a television control room.
But on Tuesday, she presented her plan for taking the storied news division forward after a series of moves that has damaged its standing among viewers, failed to improve ratings, lowered internal morale and generated highly negative press coverage.
Weiss, addressing the staff gathered at the CBS Broadcast Center in Manhattan, reached out to those who have not been impressed with what they have seen so far. “I’m not going to stand up here today and ask for your trust,” she said, according to a transcript provided by CBS News. “I’m going to earn it, just like we have to do with our viewers.”
The statement was an acknowledgment that the early days of Weiss’ tenure have not been smooth. Weiss has dealt with her own lack of familiarity with TV news procedures, the entrenched culture of a legacy media institution and suspicion that partisan politics are driving changes. The town hall-style meeting was an attempt at a reset.
Weiss fought the claims that her mandate at CBS News is to provide friendlier coverage to the Trump administration as parent company Paramount pursues an acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery. She said she has never discussed CBS News coverage of the White House with Paramount Chief Executive David Ellison, to whom she reports.
Paramount Chief Executive David Ellison attends the premiere of “Ghosted” at AMC Lincoln Square in New York in April 2023.
(Evan Agostini/Evan Agostini/Invision/AP)
“I’m here to do one thing,” Weiss said. “It’s not to be a mouthpiece for anybody. It’s simply to be a mouthpiece for fairness and the pursuit of truth.”
She told employees her business goal for CBS News is to expand its reach on digital platforms.
“We are not doing enough to meet audiences where they are, so they are leaving us,” she said, adding that the network’s strategy until now has been “to cling to the audience that remains on broadcast television. If we stick to that strategy, we’re toast.”
Weiss said she wants to focus on expanding the most successful CBS News programs — “60 Minutes,” “CBS Sunday Morning” and true crime magazine “48 Hours” to other platforms, including podcasts, newsletters and live events. “We need to shift to a streaming mentality immediately,” she said, adding that “our competitors are not just the other broadcast networks.
The pronouncement — which could have been made five to 10 years ago — was welcomed by some CBS News employees who believe the operation has lagged in using its resources to expand beyond traditional TV. Overall, they were encouraged by Weiss’ remarks.
“She went a good way to bring people together,” said one attendee. “That was a good start.”
One question posed to Weiss, which is likely to loom over her tenure, is how much time does CBS News have to replace the substantial revenue still generated by traditional TV with digital enterprises. Ad rates for digital platforms are substantially lower than those for TV, which means greater dependence on subscriptions and other revenue sources.
Weiss did not provide any specifics on the level of investment for the new initiatives. “The emphasis going forward is going to be building things that people are ultimately willing to pay for,” she said.
Weiss said the network is recruiting “fresh young talent” that will focus on reporting first through social media, “but will appear everywhere else too.” She showed three recent hires based in London, Kyiv and New York who deliver their stories across different platforms using their iPhones.
Weiss also announced the hiring of 19 new contributors, several of whom have already appeared on the Free Press, the digital news site that CBS News parent Paramount acquired as part of the deal to bring her into the company.
The dependence on contributors, who are not employees but paid for their TV appearances, is commonly used on cable news networks that need to fill hours of programming.
Weiss has acknowledged to colleagues that she’s not familiar with the process of moving the assembly line of stories from the assignment stage, through the reporting and editing process and onto a schedule of programs, some of which run 365 days a year.
Her lack of experience was glaring in her handling of “60 Minutes,” the network’s most prestigious and profitable program. CBS News staffers were stunned when she decided to pull a segment on the abuses at an El Salvador prison used by the U.S. government to detain undocumented immigrants from Venezuela.
“CBS Evening News” anchor Tony Dokoupil and the network’s chief national correspondent Matt Gutman.
(CBS News)
The story had been researched and reported for months by correspondent Sharyn Alfonsi and fully vetted by the standards department when Weiss yanked it one day before its originally scheduled Dec. 21 air date. Alfonsi called the move political and the conflict added to the narrative that Weiss is trying to placate the White House.
Weiss insisted Alfonsi’s story needed more reporting including an interview with an administration official, even though the White House had already declined requests to participate. The segment ran a month later with only minor additions to the reporting which executives inside the news division say was not worth the public drama created by Weiss’ editorial decision.
At the meeting, Weiss acknowledged she would have approached the matter differently but defended her intent.
“It’s always gonna be my prerogative as editor of this newsroom to say that I want more information, and to push to get more information,” she said. “Now, am I ever going to hold something again after it has been put out there with promos? I don’t want to make that exact same decision again, no I do not.”
Weiss added that Paramount management had no influence on her decision to hold Alfonsi’s story. “I wanna just say this as plainly and clearly as possible,” she said. “I was not pressured by David Ellison or anyone else.”
She said the journalism standards at the network have not changed since she arrived, but believed the division has been more welcoming to a wider range of viewpoints.
“I don’t think a year ago CBS News would’ve had [former National Rifle Assn. spokesperson] Dana Loesch, let’s say, on the morning show,” Weiss said. “I think that’s something to be proud of.”
Weiss praised the revamped “CBS Evening News with Tony Dokoupil” — with a new anchor she handpicked, even though critics have been harsh and the ratings have slipped. All three of the major network evening newscasts are down in January compared to a year ago, but CBS is off the most at around 20%.
Segments on the program, such as Dokoupil’s frothy tribute to Secretary of State Marco Rubio and a brief item on the fifth anniversary of the Jan. 6 insurrection in Washington that had President Trump calling it the fault of the Capitol police, were widely panned. But the attention has died down as the program has settled into being a straight-ahead newscast.
While the fiascoes involving “60 Minutes” or the first week of the “CBS Evening News” have been demoralizing, some journalists in the division are still hopeful Weiss can be a catalyst for change and want her to succeed.
But her rocky start will be tough to turn around according to Tom Bettag, a former network news producer who is now a lecturer at the University of Maryland’s Philip Merrill College of Journalism.
“Weiss started off so miserably with ’60 Minutes’ and the Dokoupil launch, that you wonder if she can redeem herself,” Bettag said. “You only get one chance to make a first impression.”
Weiss isn’t the first executive to be put in charge of a TV news operation without any hands-on experience. It was not easy for the others, either.
Michael Gartner, a Pulitzer Prize-winning newspaper editor was appointed to oversee NBC News in the mid-1980s. During his turbulent five-year tenure, he struggled with talent egos as he tried to get costs under control. Walter Isaacson came from Time magazine to run CNN in 2001. He was gone after 18 months, expressing bewilderment over the public scrutiny of every network move.
Weiss’ previous management experience was running the Free Press, which has a staff of 60 compared to the sprawling CBS News operation with more than 1,200 employees around the world.
Weiss is also an anomaly as she comes to the job with an established point of view. Her journalism career was as an opinion writer before she launched the Free Press. The site gained a following for its criticism of the progressive left and purveyors of so-called “woke” policies.
Weiss has been vocal in telling CBS News employees that the public has less trust in legacy media, an assertion that is often pushed by Trump and his supporters. (She told the meeting that the network needs to target “independents … those who want to equip themselves with all the facts, who are curious to hear what’s going on, even if it offends their sensibilities.”)
Weiss carries that agenda while she tries to overcome the whispers of “she’s not one of us” at CBS News, which even loyal insiders believe leans too heavily on its storied history defined by 20th century journalism icons such as Walter Cronkite and Edward R. Murrow.
“I think this place has allowed the ghosts of the past to walk these halls a little too much,” one CBS News journalist said. “They need to be acknowledged, but not obsessed over every day. The New York Yankees don’t sit around dwelling on Babe Ruth every day. They focus on winning.”
While “60 Minutes” and “CBS Evening News” are the editorial backbone of the division and are getting the bulk of Weiss’ attention, the division also has to chart a future course for “CBS Mornings,” a major revenue generator. Co-host Gayle King’s contract is up in May and last year there were leaks to an industry trade suggesting that Paramount wants her to return in another role and presumably a lower salary.
“CBS Mornings” is in third place behind ABC’s “Good Morning America” and NBC’s “Today,” but still has a following and King is the most recognizable star in the news division. Morning show viewing is habitual and a change in the host chair could lead King’s fans to abandon the program. Once viewers leave, it’s hard to get them back, especially in today’s fragmented media environment where consumers have a seemingly endless array of alternatives.
At the town hall, Weiss gave a positive shout-out to King, who is angry over the press reports. “I’ve had people come and pet me like a puppy and say, ‘I’m sorry that you’re leaving CBS, I won’t watch those guys anymore,’” King said.
“I just want everyone here to know that she’s absolutely beloved,” Weiss said. “And we see her long into the future here at CBS.”
People close to the morning program who were not authorized to comment publicly believe King would return for another contract. But the network is already preparing for the future if King does depart.
Adriana Diaz and Kelly O’Grady were named co-hosts of “CBS Saturday Morning” and will be the principal fill-ins for King on the weekday program, clearly an attempt to get them familiar with the audience. “It’s a very explicit attempt to start building a bench,” said one insider.
Before the town hall meeting on Tuesday, many CBS News veterans were frustrated that Weiss had not addressed the entire division during the first three months of her tenure. King, who told colleagues she was impressed overall with the presentation, told Weiss they needed to meet sooner.
“For many people — they’ve never even heard your freakin’ voice,” King said. “So it’s good to hear, to see you’re a real person and this is what you want.”
Why Carol Kirkwood is leaving BBC Breakfast in ‘really hard move’ – everything we know – The Mirror
Need to know
After nearly three decades on screen, Carol Kirkwood is leaving BBC Breakfast in a move she has said was “really really hard” to make, and her real reason has been revealed
15:46, 27 Jan 2026Updated 15:46, 27 Jan 2026
What to know about Carol Kirkwood’s BBC exit as she makes ‘really hard move’(Image: BBC)
Why is Carol Kirkwood leaving BBC Breakfast?
Carol Kirkwood, who has spent 28 years on BBC Breakfast, has decided to leave the show. The weather presenter struggled to hold back the tears as she announced the decision and shared why she didn’t want to be on the show anymore.
“I am going to be leaving,” she said. “It’s really, really hard for me to say this. I love my job. I love all of you guys, my weather colleagues, every department I work with, and, of course, all the viewers I’ve been so engaged with for many years.”
She added that she did not want to still work on the show when she couldn’t reach areas on the map anymore. “It’s great. I don’t want to be coming in with my Zimmer frame when I can’t reach the northern Isles anymore.”
Carol continued to say that she was “going to be spending more time with Steve, my gorgeous husband”. Carol has been married to police officer Steve Randall since 2023, but she says they’ve been like “ships passing in the night” due to conflicting schedules. She finished her announcement by saying: “I love my job. I’ve loved working at the BBC. But I love my husband more than my job. More than anyone!”
Elsewhere, Carol has said that she is looking forward to lie ins and getting rid of her alarm clock. “Alarm clocks will be a thing of the past!” she joked. She added that she felt the “time is right”. She said: “You know, the future is rosy and the time is right, absolutely right for me to go so new beginnings for everyone.”
The decision has supposedly been in the works since Easter, but was kept secret from many members of staff. Host Sally Nugent explained: “We should just put that this is everybody finding out now. So there are people in this room finding out now. There are people on our production team just outside the studio who are finding out now. It has been a while since you have been able to talk about it.”
