Misinterpreted 'hostile takeover' comment leads F-16s to intercept plane over Okla. air base

[MindPilot]

Source: San Diego Union-Tribune / AP

11:24 a.m. June 13, 2007

KANSAS CITY, Mo. – F-16s intercepted a small plane after officials misinterpreted a phrase uttered by the pilot as his aircraft flew over military airspace: “hostile takeover."

The pilot was talking about business, the plane's owner said. But a frantic air traffic controller couldn't confirm that because the pilot had turned off his radio, said Maj. Roger Yates of the Clay County Sheriff's Department.

Within minutes, federal aviation authorities scrambled the fighter jets to intercept the plane Monday evening just outside of Oklahoma City and escort it to the Clay County airport near Mosby.
Once it was on the ground, more than a dozen armed federal agents and tactical deputies surrounded the plane. Federal authorities, who interviewed the pilot for two hours, said Tuesday that there was no threat to anyone and no charges would be filed.



Read more: http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/nation/20070613-1124-forcedlanding.html

---

Yet on 911...need I point out the obvious?

[niyad]

1. and, of course, payne stewart's death.

[hack89]

3. It took over an hour to intercept his plane.

take a look at the NTSB report. By the Payne Stewart standard 9/11 makes perfect sense.

[niyad]

5. my point was that a private plane went off course, and there were fighter planes on it--regardless

of how long it took. no, the payne stewart situation does not make 9/11 make perfect sense.

[hack89]

20. Payne Stewart show that there was no organized response

instead there was an ad hoc reaction where unarmed fighters on previously scheduled flights were rerouted in flight. Why weren't dedicated air defense fighters scrambled to intercept? Do you think a similar response to 911 would have stopped the hijacked planes?

[SayWhatYo]

45. And what would be said if they had shot down the 9/11 planes?

"how'd they get up there so quick? They must have known about it before hand, I mean look what happened with Payne Stewart... They usually takes over an hour... they knew"

or just general complaining about why they were shot down... Now, I'm making a dig at those who think there was far more going on behind the scenes(in fact I find a lot of odd things and am glad there are some people looking into it, I mean ya never know)... but my point is that there will also be something and someone will find that something and turn it into something bigger.

[mitchum]

47. Well, they did shoot down the Pennsylvania plane (n/t)

[yurbud]

49. read the performance stats on F-15 & F-16. I grew up next to an air guard base

and got into the control room as a cadet.

This is all NORAD does, day in and day out.

While the F-15 & 16 will fly subsonic for a routine intercept like Payne Stewart, once a hijacked plane hits a builiding, they could have hit the burners, gone supersonic, and could have been on the remaining planes before they hit anything.

Both those planes can accelerate going straight up and get to 40K feet in about a minute. If they are dead cold , add another ten. The can travel at over 1500 mph, and the first air force general to testify to congress said they were flying like "scalded apes" but when you look at the times, he cited and do the math, it was under 500 mph, slower than an airliner usually travels.

[niyad]

6. how about providing a link to that report, please?

[Make7]

15. Try this:

http://www.google.com/search?q=site:ntsb.gov "payne stewart"

- Make7

[MindPilot]

8. IIRC fighters were on that plane within about 15 minutes

after it was determined it had deviated from its flight plan. I could be wrong though.

On edit: Yeah I was wrong -- it was 8 minutes from contact to intercept.

About 0952 CDT,7 a USAF F-16 test pilot from the 40th Flight Test Squadron at Eglin Air Force Base (AFB), Florida, was vectored to within 8 nm of N47BA.8 About 0954 CDT, at a range of 2,000 feet from the accident airplane and an altitude of about 46,400 feet,9 the test pilot made two radio calls to N47BA but did not receive a response. About 1000 CDT, the test pilot began a visual inspection of N47BA.

[Barrett808]

10. That's what I recall as well. Paging Paul Thompson...

He'd be the guy to ask.

[Make7]

16. Try this:

http://www.google.com/search?q=site:www.cooperativeresearch.org "payne stewart"

- Make7

[hack89]

17. How long from lost contact to intercept?

in other words, how long did it take to recognize there was a problem and react to it?

[MindPilot]

21. 15 minutes from last radio contact to ordering intercept.

Then another 8 minutes to intercept. Total of 23 minutes from the time ATC first became aware there was a problem to actual intercept.

"At 0927:18 EDT, N47BA acknowledged the clearance by stating, "three nine zero bravo alpha." This was the last known radio transmission from the airplane.4 The sound of the cabin altitude aural warning5 was not heard on the ATC recording of this transmission.6

At 0933:38 EDT (6 minutes and 20 seconds after N47BA acknowledged the previous clearance), the controller instructed N47BA to change radio frequencies and contact another Jacksonville ARTCC controller. The controller received no response from N47BA. The controller called the flight five more times over the next 4 1/2 minutes but received no response.

About 0952 CDT,7 a USAF F-16 test pilot from the 40th Flight Test Squadron at Eglin Air Force Base (AFB), Florida, was vectored to within 8 nm of N47BA.8 About 0954 CDT, at a range of 2,000 feet from the accident airplane and an altitude of about 46,400 feet,9 the test pilot made two radio calls to N47BA but did not receive a response. About 1000 CDT, the test pilot began a visual inspection of N47BA."

http://www.ntsb.gov/publictn/2000/AAB0001.htm

Yet on 911 there were four confirmed simultaneous hijacks and not one fighter up for the better part of four hours.

[hack89]

25. You missed the time zone change

0927 EDT to 0952 CDT equals one hour 25 minutes

[MindPilot]

35. D'oh

You're right.

[yurbud]

48. he was flying over the empty part of the US, and it was just his plane

as soon as one plane hit the WTC, they should have turned on the burners for the others and they could have had eyes on the target in 15-20 minutes.

[MindPilot]

7. Yep, and that was PRE-9/11 so I'm officially sick of that excuse.

the part here I wonder about--and any DU'ers who are members of the aviation community help me out here--"the pilot turned off his radio". I certainly never did and no pilot I know ever turns the radio off. It may get switched to a different frequency, but never off, and even the freq changes are acknowledged and approved. Even the background chatter can have valuable information.

[karlrschneider]

28. It's an odd story. I can't imagine turning off the comm radio either.

And the chit-chat about business doesn't seem quite right to me, or the paranoia about destination either. Sounds like the pilot is a dummy (if the details are accurate)...he could have made up some destination anyway. If he was VFR it wouldn't matter and if he was IFR they would know it already. Going through Vance's airspace is no big deal, it's just traffic advisories. Very strange.

[Solo_in_MD]

50. The pilot may have changed frequencies...

MSM reporting of aviation events often misses those kind of nuances.

[indepat]

2. Gee, what a shame our F-16s were not as efficient/up to the task on 9-11

[hack89]

4. Perhaps standards are a little more stringent post 9/11?

i have ask before and no one can show me that interceptions over the main land were common pre-911. Payne Stewart was the only one I could find record of and even that one was an ad hoc intercept by planes already in the air on routine flights. It also took over a hour.

[nashville_brook]

11. use the google with the words: norad intercept standard procedure

[hack89]

19. So if it was common then there is actual evidence of it happening

right? Because we know that the government is a super efficient organization that always follows its own rules to the letter.

[MindPilot]

24. Sometimes government agencies do work - ATC is one of those

Air Traffic Controllers tend to follow the procedures to the letter because that tends to keep people alive.

Standard procedure IIRC is if an aircraft is off course for five minutes or five miles and/or doesn't respond to radio instructions, call NORAD.

[hack89]

26. So why are there no recorded instances of this happening?

That is the only question I have.

[karlrschneider]

29. It wasn't really newsworthy before 9/11. Like highway patrolmen pulling over speeders

wasn't a big story.

[hack89]

30. Sure - yet there are plenty of stories of

planes being diverted for sick, drunk or wacko people. I don't buy it. I know a lot of frequent business fliers - no one has ever mention such a thing to me so I don't believe it was common at all.

[karlrschneider]

31. I'm not saying it was common but I have overheard it happening several times.

I have about 7,500 hours in the last 35 years. It happened every now and then in the 1970s when hijackings were popular but from about 82 or so, I guess, until 2001 didn't occur very often.

[hack89]

33. I agree

I think that after the end of the cold war the USAF did not devote many resources for the air defense of the continental US. What with fighting an undeclared air war in the ME (Operations Southern and Northern Watch) on top of a major force reduction, I think that the USAF decided that they did not have enough resources do accomplish all its missions and since there was the perception that the air threat against America was significantly reduced, air defense was a good place to cut back. It was about that time that the Continental Air defense mission was shifted from the active forces to the Air Force Reserves.

[karlrschneider]

39. Yes, I was in the AF in the 60s when Norad where I worked was still

part of ADC. Very much in the midst of the cold war and even then I overheard a lot of discussion and disagreement over how much of a threat the USSR really was and a subset of that argument, whether to worry more about missiles or bombers. It seemed to me they were more focused on Broken Arrow exercises, though, given how often they scheduled them. I recall one day we were sitting in base ops yakking about various things and some BG said something about MAD. I looked at him and said "Yeah, Maniacs Acting Dumb." He didn't like me very much after that. ;-)

[hack89]

41. LOL nt

[MindPilot]

12. How about a personal experience?

I clipped the restricted airspace over Rocky Mountain Arsenal in a Beech Sundowner. ATC gave me a vector clear of area By the time I'd made my turn there was a Huey gunship on my ass making damn sure I got out of their airspace.

The whole thing was over in maybe two minutes. That was 1975.

[karlrschneider]

32. You just reminded me of something I did once, maybe 1973 or so

Was flying a 310 from Richmond to somewhere in New England. Was VFR on top and not paying much attention.
Noticed some breaks in the overcast below me and looked straight down at the White House. Needless to say I was wishing I hadn't packed my clean underwear in the wing locker! I thought "Well shit, it's too late now, all I can do
is keep going and hope nobody noticed!"

I guess nobody did but I didn't breathe much for about 20 minutes. :silly:

[Jackpine Radical]

13. OK, Payne Stewart's interception took over an hour.

Compare that to events of 9-11. A major airliner switched off its course over Ohio & flew into the WTC. No interception--OK. They just weren't ready. Nearly an hour later another airliner does the same thing, THE SAME THING, having departed the same airport, and heads for NYC, where it hits the second tower. Still no response from the military. WTF? And then a THIRD GODDAM PLANE HEADS FOR THE PENTAGON & STILL NO REACTION. The Pentagon is the nerve center of the American military. Do you get the enormity of this event? Two planes have already attacked buildings. A third plane is doing the same thing & heading for the Pentagon. WE don't respond. The United States military, with more than two hours' warning, DOES NOTHING TO DEFEND ITSELF FROM AN ATTACK ON ITS OWN BRAIN!

Don't give me this Payne Stewart shit.

[hack89]

18. So you actually have evidence of intercepts over land?

I would love to see it. Why the hostility - I am merely asking for facts.

[MindPilot]

22. Happens often enough that AOPA issues a reference card

http://www.aopa.org/asf/publications/intercept.pdf

[hack89]

27. Is this pre-911?

That's the question - how common were over land intercepts pre-911? I also accept that over water intercepts in the Air Defense Identification Zones (ADIZ) were very common - but since there was no over land ADIZs I think that without proof it is reasonable to question whether the US military was prepared to conduct quick reaction intercepts over land. If they are as common as you think then surely you can provide some pre-911 examples of US airliners being intercepted while in US overland air space.

[karlrschneider]

34. Uh, there has been a Southern ADIZ (Mexican border) for decades.

There is a sort of 'junior ADIZ' between the U.S. and Canada but the procedures are much less onerous since we share the land/sea ADIZ on the coasts with them. I don't think there's much airplane drug smuggling going on these days from Mexico but back in the 70s and 80s when it was commonplace there were a lot of intercepts (though admittedly for different reasons (excuses?) than nowadays.

[hack89]

38. Again you are missing my point ...

the ADIZ extend from the US borders outward - the entire point being that unidentified aircraft approaching the US are intercepted and identified. There was no ADIZ over the continental US.

[karlrschneider]

42. I suppose I misunderstood when you wrote

"but since there was no over land ADIZs I think that without proof it is reasonable to question whether the US military was prepared to conduct quick reaction intercepts over land."

--------------------------------------------------------------
I guess the ADIZ between USA and Mexico isn't technically over the U.S. mainland but it's definitely over land.
If there are any -now- other than the one around D.C. I haven't had occasion to run across them.

[Jackpine Radical]

23. Sorry, the hostility really wasn't intended.

I didn't need to add that last line. My only point is that it seems quite incredible to me that our military would have been unable to defend itself against an attack on the Pentagon (of all places!) when they already knew that attacks were being made by hijacked airliners. That, among other things concerning the Pentagon attack, really strain my credulity.

[Decruiter]

44. It's nice to know that people still respond like this to 9-11 data

....as it pertains to today's events. It is nice to know we will never forget...

[nashville_brook]

9. too bad none of the hijacked 911 pilots thought to say "hostile takeover"

who knew it would be that easy to get an F-16 intercept!

[Demeter]

14. When EF Hutton Talks.....

sorry, I couldn't resist--4 days of real summer weather and my morals are trashed.....

[GliderGuider]

36. Têtes à claques

This is a VERY popular site out of Quebec. Sorry, but it isn't translated. If you know French, please click these links. You soon be as addicted to Têtes à claques as every French-speaking person in Canada.

http://www.tetesaclaques.tv/video.php?vid=22
Here the pilot is calling ground control for help because a the steward told him that a passenger has a nail file and is -- right this minute -- filing his nails. Not only that, but he has a bottle of grape juice!
Ground control obliges by dispatching F-18s.

http://www.tetesaclaques.tv/video.php?vid=37
The co-pilot asks the captain if he thinks ground control will really dispatch F-18s. The captain says no, they're a bunch of jokers. Co-pilot asks what are the 2 little blips on the radar.
The F-18 pilot tells the captain to prepare to be blown out of the sky because of the atomic bomb in the bottle of grape juice. The captain says it was all a misunderstanding. The F-18 pilot asks for a description of the passenger. He's a red-head with freckles and he's NOT wearing a turban. So the F-18 pilot says to divert the flight to Koujouac in northern Quebec. The co-pilot says that the passengers will not be happy because they're headed for Fort Lauderdale.

http://www.tetesaclaques.tv/video.php?vid=72
The captain is giving his side of the story to CSIS agents. He says that as soon as he learned that a passenger had a nail file he immediately went to Yellow Alert -- that is, don't panic, but be vigilant. Or, as pilots say in the biz, something stinks but no one farted on the plane.
The agents ask Mr. Tremblay, the passenger, where he was at the time that he was consuming the bottle of grape juice. "On the plane."
A-ha! Have you ever been to a training camp in Afghanistan? Have you ever eaten couscous with a member of Al-Quaeda? Have you ever played Bingo in the basement of a mosque? Are you taking belly dancing lessons?
No!
When you were young, did you ever blow up a frog by putting a firecracker in its mouth?
Only once.
And the questions continue until the passenger says Woah! I know my rights as a Canadian citizen! I bought a package for a resort in Ft. Lauderdale and here I am being interrogated by the Secret Service. I refuse to answer any more questions without the presence of my travel agent and a pina colada.
So the agents ask themselves, is this a terrorist or a tourist?
"There comes a point when you just don't know anymore."

[karlrschneider]

40. That's hilarious. The guy's lucky he didn't say "I'm a TOURIST with a big BUM"

:rofl:

[Xenotime]

37. How did he hear if he turned off his radio?!?

I'm not buying the story.

[Karenina]

43. Hi, Jack!

:rofl:

[Karenina]

46. I've just gone looking for confirmation

of that passenger to pilot "Hi, Jack" legend and have found NOTHING including on Snopes. Can anyone help me determine if it is just urban myth or based in fact?