Fighters scramble in miami

[theavonlady 2]

It was an Old Quaeda attack:

Quote[/b] ]Air Rage Granny Scrambles Fighters

Wed November 26, 2003 08:15 AM ET

MIAMI (Reuters) - Fighter jets were scrambled at Miami airport on Tuesday after an elderly woman threw a fit on an American Airlines plane and flight attendants thought she would attack them, police said.

Reports said the woman was aged between 69 and 79.

"They said old," a police spokeswoman said, adding she could not confirm her precise age.

The pilot of flight AA-2133 with 126 passengers on board announced an emergency as a precaution shortly after taking off for Caracas, and fighter jets were scrambled to escort the plane back to Miami international airport.

The plane landed safely.

[Tamme 0]

What good can a fighter jet do if someone is going to blow up the plane? Shoot it down?

[mr burns 132]

It was an Old Quaeda attack..

hahaha    

btw: wht´s a fit ?

edit: and who´s gonna pay the cost for the fighters fuel andsoon ?? i think i know the answer already..it´s the stupid (no offense) taxpayer´s again

[Guest]

Fit....usually means an epilleptic attack of some kind, but basically it is a loss of control. However, "throw a fit" usually means getting angry...which is what I think they are saying. All a bit pathetic I think...

[Gollum1 0]

What good can a fighter jet do if someone is going to blow up the plane? Shoot it down?

Ha! Exactly! This is just beyond ridiculous.

[theavonlady 2]

What good can a fighter jet do if someone is going to blow up the plane? Shoot it down?

Ha! Exactly! This is just beyond ridiculous.

What if someone is not going to blow up the plane but attempt to crash it into a populated area?

[Acecombat 0]

Doesnt this belong in the Off topic section?

[Tamme 0]

What good can a fighter jet do if someone is going to blow up the plane? Shoot it down?

Ha! Exactly! This is just beyond ridiculous.

What if someone is not going to blow up the plane but attempt to crash it into a populated area?

Shooting the thing down gets civilians killed too. Or if it gets jacked over an airport like they thought was going to happen it would prolly crash into a populated area.

[InqWiper 0]

It is better that the people in the plane die and it misses its target than the people on the plane die and it hits its target. If it hits its target it will do more damage than it would where it would be shot down.

Its not like shooting the plane down is the first thing on theire list of things to do.

[theavonlady 2]

Doesnt this belong in the Off topic section?  

Oooops.

[Hjaldar 0]

As a German fighter pilot once said to this topic: "That's a damn heavy box [the plane] going down then". Shooting down a plane somewhere over the desert may be useful, but there are no "unpopulated" places here in Middle Europe...

[Placebo 29]

Please look before you leap (post)

Moving to OT.

[theavonlady 2]

Please look before you leap (post)

Well, it just gives ya something to do.

[Winters 1]

Ha Ha Ha

Thats just too funny, whats next a full alert because of crying babies?

I wonder what would happen if i started playing OFP on my laptop and booted up the fierce firefight in "We Stand Alone, Together" right in the middle of JFK airport

[mr burns 132]

Fit....usually means an epilleptic attack of some kind, but basically it is a loss of control. However, "throw a fit" usually means getting angry...

lol ... that makes it even funnier. actually i thought she really threw something at the plane .. but this´s just ridiculous

[theavonlady 2]

Ha Ha Ha

Thats just too funny, whats next a full alert because of crying babies?

I wonder what would happen if i started playing OFP on my laptop and booted up the fierce firefight in "We Stand Alone, Together" right in the middle of JFK airport      

*cough*

[Winters 1]

@ Avon:

Ha, thats funny. i thought it sounded familiar as i typed it.

[FSPilot 0]

What good can a fighter jet do if someone is going to blow up the plane? Shoot it down?

Ha! Exactly! This is just beyond ridiculous.

Well, it's a simple concept.  If the terrorist wanted to blow up an airliner, they'd do it instead of making a scene and giving everybody a warning.  So it's a much bigger probability that they're going to hijack the airliner instead of just blowing it up.

Either way, 100+ people would of died.  But more would of died if the fighter pilots had waited for the terrorists to ram a building with the airliner.

[denoir 0]

Hijackings of planes are not usually about blowing the plane up. Normally the hijacker issues some demand ("fly me to Cuba") and threatens to execute the passengers one by one unless his demands are met.

Worst case scenario: he kills a couple of hostages and then gets killed by the police when the plane lands.

So shooting down a plane with 100+ hostages to prevent a guy from flying to a tropical paradise might not be such a good idea.

It's understandable however that after the WTC attacks people are a bit jumpy when it comes to hijacked airplanes. From an objective point of view however and by looking at the history of hijacking in the world it's fairly certain to say that hijackers don't tend to fly planes into buildings and most are not suicidal.

[The Frenchman 0]

Quote[/b] ]Worst case scenario: he kills a couple of hostages and then gets killed by the police when the plane lands.

I belive worst case scenario would be if it killed the 100 passengers by crashing it or somthing else like that.

(BTW, Long time no see FS )

[Tex -USMC- 0]

Hijackings of planes are not usually about blowing the plane up. Normally the hijacker issues some demand ("fly me to Cuba") and threatens to execute the passengers one by one unless his demands are met.

With four recent and very notable exceptions that, if you hadn't noticed, still weigh heavily on America's collective mind.

[edc 0]

Quote[/b] ]From an objective point of view however and by looking at the history of hijacking in the world it's fairly certain to say that hijackers don't tend to fly planes into buildings and most are not suicidal.

Its better to be safe than sorry. Its just not worth the risk that it could have been someone trying to hijack the plane, and crash it into something. And in the whole scheme of things, a few minutes of fuel for two vipers isn't even noticeable.

[Major Fubar 0]

Two things I wonder:

How much of a threat could an unarmed 69+ year old woman have constituted (unless she had smuggled a gun or bomb onboard - which was apparently not the case)? The whole thing smacks of an overreaction to me. Surely the flight attendants are sufficiently capable of dealing with digruntled senior citizens, without having to call in a possible "hijacking"...

And was the woman, perhaps, of "middle eastern" extraction - and did someone leap to the conclusion that she must be a terrorist based on her ethnic appearance? (Just guessing, but I would be curious to know).

[Tex -USMC- 0]

The whole thing smacks of an overreaction to me.

I think you just summed up the entire fiasco with one word.

[FSPilot 0]

denoir

Quote[/b] ]It's understandable however that after the WTC attacks people are a bit jumpy when it comes to hijacked airplanes. From an objective point of view however and by looking at the history of hijacking in the world it's fairly certain to say that hijackers don't tend to fly planes into buildings and most are not suicidal.

Realistically, they probably wouldn't shoot down a hijacked plane right off the bat. But if it started moving towards a populated area or any other target a terrorist might be interested in they'd probably shoot it down

Major Fubar

Quote[/b] ]How much of a threat could an unarmed 69+ year old woman have constituted (unless she had smuggled a gun or bomb onboard - which was apparently not the case)? The whole thing smacks of an overreaction to me. Surely the flight attendants are sufficiently capable of dealing with digruntled senior citizens, without having to call in a possible "hijacking"...

And was the woman, perhaps, of "middle eastern" extraction - and did someone leap to the conclusion that she must be a terrorist based on her ethnic appearance? (Just guessing, but I would be curious to know).

I think they have to call it in whether they can deal with it or not.