MSP employees give soothing voice to airport announcements

When officials at Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport invited employees to enter a contest to record the public service announcements piped daily throughout the terminals, a colleague nudged Lykoung Wong, who works in the employee service center for Delta Air Lines. C'mon, she said. Let's do it, it'll be fun.

Wong figured: "What's the worst that could happen? I could get picked?"

Now the calm, steady voice advising passengers at MSP about federal security rules for liquids, gels and aerosols is that of Wong, a Richfield resident and 10-year Delta employee.

"When people come to the airport, they want it to be an enjoyable experience," Wong said, adding that airport announcements should "sound like your sister or the girl next door, or the people who run a mom-and-pop store. They want to feel like the person is real."

The Metropolitan Airports Commission (MAC), which operates MSP, decided last year to replace voice professionals with the voices of airport employees to welcome the flying public and provide important information. Some airports feature celebrities or local elected officials on their PA system.

This year, 10 MSP employees were chosen in an open audition, including a chief pilot, a police officer and an arts program coordinator.

The new announcements, recorded at an on-site studio, can be heard throughout MSP's terminal lobbies and concourses, as well as baggage carousels and automated exits, inside airport trams and along moving walkways.

"We have no shortage of employees who want to lend their voices to help make MSP more personable and welcoming to our millions of travelers," said Phil Burke, the MAC's assistant director of customer experience, in a news release. Before the COVID-19 pandemic, some 20,000 people worked at the airport.

Noah Keesecker, arts program coordinator for the Airport Foundation MSP, didn't have to be pushed to enter the competition. When he heard about the auditions, the Minneapolis resident said, "Something clicked in the creative part of my brain. Note to self: Must. Do. This.

Months later, Keesecker's voice welcomes travelers to Terminal 2, with helpful tips about parking and security.

"It's gratifying to use your voice to help people feel welcome at the airport. The airport does a good job, but [travel] can be disconcerting," said Keesecker, who has a background as a music composer.

As spring break gets underway and the pandemic eases, MSP is seeing an increasing number of passengers. Air travel during the outbreak has been fraught, with sometimes violent disagreements about mask use breaking out on flights and in terminals across the country. A soothing, relatable voice can calm those travel jitters.

"We have discovered some very talented individuals through the program, some who have done voice work in the past and some who are sharing their voice to a wider audience for the first time," Burke said.

MAC officials added that the program is a chance for employees "to share their hidden or emerging voice talents."

But Airport Police Sgt. Mark Ledbetter, the new voice that warns about unattended bags, said he's fairly certain he'll keep his day job. When he first heard his own announcement advising travelers to keep an eye on their luggage, he was a little taken aback. "I mean, do you like the way your voice sounds?" he asks.

Ledbetter, of Minnetonka, hears his voice nonstop as he patrols the baggage claim area.

"The irony, of course, is if people don't watch their bags, even after my voice told them to watch their bags, they will have to deal with the person who told them to watch their bags," he said, with a laugh. "It's kind of weird."

Wong agrees that hearing your own voice while walking about the airport can be, as we say in Minnesota, different. "I thought, 'That's cool. Does my voice really sound like that?'"

Wong, MSP's new voice of the Transportation Security Administration's 3-1-1 rule , noted that her fiancé works as a TSA agent at the airport.

"Now he hears my voice all day long at work," she said.