Sad and tragic on many levels, but how does it relate to the political sphere?
ETAāCNN reports the pilot died.
Perhaps it serves as vindication of the current Transportation Security Administrationās superior performance in protecting our metropolitan areas from potentially terrorist theft of aircraft and misuse of them as weapons, preventing a recurrence of the 9/11/2001 attacks.
Or perhaps it serves as vindication of the current Department of Health and Human Servicesā superior performance in identifying, isolating, and treating mental health cases.
I imagine they will find a flight simulator on his computer when they search his home.
I could argue that when a thing is so strange and raises so many questions, it becomes less important that itās outside a particular interest area of a publication. TPM serves a variety of purposes and one is being a forum for people who find it interesting to exchange views about all kinds of things. Thatās why you see so many āOT butā¦ā and why people go off on tangents about music or birdwatching or whatever. If there were no post about this, many of us would feel an itch to talk about it anyway. So you might as well just add it and let people talk.
I do think itās of interest to the public and body politic that this poor guy could just climb into a large passenger aircraft and fly it the hell away. I read they donāt have keys at that size, but do they have any kind of security at all? Are they that easy to fly? I was struck just that it was possible.
The one that ran on MS-DOS on first-generation IBM PCs. Good for looping, bad for landing.
Winning biglyā¦
"Later the man said: āIāve got a lot of people that care about me. Itās going to disappoint them to hear that I did thisā¦Just a broken guy, got a few screws loose, I guess.ā
An insane man in a careening stolen airplane is more truthful than the president of the united states.
And more self-aware.
Iām surprised that the runways and taxiways at an international airport were so un-busy that he could somehow butt in line and/or take off before he got stopped.
Or maybe thatās where the failure was? Maybe they had lots of time to stop him on the ground but no one even noticed this extra plane in the mix?
Evidently he was one of the people who do the guiding on the ground, so heād probably have a sense of the traffic flow. You can imagine how horrific it would be, like Tenerife that time, if heād gotten in the way of another plane. Yeesh.
Also it occurs to me an empty plane is overpowered, like a sports car. Iāve been in jumbo jets with like four passengers aboard shuttling from NYC to Philly and the damn thing just jumps off the ground.
Well at least we know our POTUS is au courant on this issue. I await with bated breath what new policy Stephen Miller will propose to keep us safe form illegal plane joy riders.
Putting aside everything else, I just find this story incredibly sad. Obviously, I know nothing about the man, but listening to the recording gave me the sense that he was probably a good guy suffering a mental health crisis and maybe just needed a shoulder to cry on and to get into therapy. Iām sorry he didnāt get the help he needed. Iām sorry weāre a country that just doesnāt take mental health very seriously.
We only take mental health seriously if there is a gun involved, and then some are only concerned if the gun was harmed during the event.
One of several āhumanitarianā needs in this nation that too many people do not take seriously.
I didnāt listen closely to every bit but he seemed most stressed by the prospect of landing safely when they talked about it, like it was tempting but yet not his preference or plan. Otherwise he seemed carefree and ready to just lay down the burden of continued existence. Just that final acceptance you sometimes see with people whoāve battled an illness and are ready to go. People called it āchillingā but I thought it was almost poetic.
I love when I hear heās āmonitoringā a thing. First of all, itās not about him so who cares. Secondly Iāll cook and eat my favorite fishing hat if āmonitoringā ever involves anything but watching TV and shoving junk food in his mouth.
Obama era headline:
Miracle on the Hudson!
.
Trump era headline:
āSuicidalā Airline Employee Crashes Stolen Plane From Sea-Tac Intāl Airport
The situation is sad and tragic for the 29 yr. old man and his family. He did not want to hurt anyone and apologized to his family and friends. As someone who lives in the Seattle area we are all breathing a sigh of relief.
He flew the plane over densely populated areas south of the airport. The small island where the plane crashed is sparsely inhabited. Whether or not the 29 yr old did this on a whim will never be known but it seemed pretty easy to steal a plane, jump the line of airplanes awaiting departure on a busy Friday night, take off and fly around for over an hour. Kudos to the air traffic controllers who stopped planes on the ground and rerouted others waiting to land.