Why isn't ‘NCIS: New Orleans’ Season 7 Episode 5 airing this week? 'Operation Drano' will make fans wait long

Bad news for fans of ‘NCIS: New Orleans’. The show will not be airing this week once again. In fact, the wait for episode 5 of the seventh season of the show entitled 'Operation Drano: Part I', as per CBS, will be a little long.

When will ‘NCIS: New Orleans’ Season 7 Episode 5 air?

Following the winter finale that aired on December 13, 'NCIS: New Orleans' Season 7 Episode 5 will air on Sunday, January 3, a little later than its usual slot, at 9:30 pm on CBS. The reason behind the delay of course is the designated winter break shows go on during the holiday season. 

The winter break is one followed by several network shows. Showrunners know that people are not going to stay glued to their screen in the midst of spending quality time with their families. Especially this year, when reasons to celebrate have been far and few. The pandemic has also stalled a lot of production, implying 'NCIS: NOLA' Season 7 might still be filmed for all we know, hence the hiatus leading to a prolonged wait between Episodes 4 and 5.

Where we left things in episode 4

We saw the NCIS team investigating dirty cops in episode 3. Episode 4 continued with that storyline. The Mayor didn’t want this mess to go on any longer. She had pledged to clean up the city, so it made sense for her to assign Special Agent Dwayne Pride (Scott Bakula), a federal agent who doesn’t fall under NOPD jurisdiction, to run the show.

But that doesn’t mean the cops did not try to scare Pride off. A SWAT team was sent to Pride’s home. They were given information from a criminal informant that a wanted man was at Pride’s home and so SWAT hit the building with a no-knock warrant. Pride and Rita were home when they did. The couple was thrown to the ground and arrested before they were finally allowed to identify themselves.

As the NCIS team realized that the dirty cops functioned like organized crime, they decided to make a case for RICCO. They wanted to take down all the dirty cops that were a part of this fraternity and so they reached to the Department of Justice. Only their petition was turned down. The people in power needed more evidence against the dirty cops and so the team still has a lot of work to do. 

But the team uncovered that several officers in a fraternity were working side jobs while they were supposedly on duty and that was a firing offense. The officers were all fired. This included their prime suspects. 

While this story is over, for the time being, Pride certainly made enemies of many cops in the episode. It is likely that those cops, especially the malicious ones who threatened Pride, may come back for revenge later in the season. 

New episodes of 'NCIS: New Orleans' Season 7 will air on Sundays at 9.30 PM only on CBS after the winter break.