Posted on 09/09/2011 1:24:55 PM PDT by SeekAndFind
Your must-read of the day. We already knew, of course, that Bush had given the order to shoot down the plane if necessary, before it could crash into another building. I remember vividly walking home to Queens from Manhattan on 9/11 and hearing a fighter jet overhead, the only time I’ve ever heard that sound in 30 years of living in NYC. It was obvious even in the chaos of that moment what they were up there looking for and what they were prepared to do if circumstances warranted. What wasn’t obvious — what we didn’t know until today, I believe — was that the jets at Andrews AFB had to scramble so quickly that the pilots didn’t have time to arm themselves before taking off. They couldn’t have shot down Flight 93 or any other hijacked plane even if they had wanted to.
So there was only one option.
“We wouldn’t be shooting it down. We’d be ramming the aircraft,” Penney recalls of her charge that day. “I would essentially be a kamikaze pilot.”…
They screamed over the smoldering Pentagon, heading northwest at more than 400 mph, flying low and scanning the clear horizon. Her commander had time to think about the best place to hit the enemy.
“We don’t train to bring down airliners,” said Sasseville, now stationed at the Pentagon. “If you just hit the engine, it could still glide and you could guide it to a target. My thought was the cockpit or the wing.”
He also thought about his ejection seat. Would there be an instant just before impact?
“I was hoping to do both at the same time,” he says. “It probably wasn’t going to work, but that’s what I was hoping.”
Penney worried about missing the target if she tried to bail out.
“If you eject and your jet soars through without impact . . .” she trails off, the thought of failing more dreadful than the thought of dying.
Flight 93 went down before they ever encountered it, so there’s two more lives saved by the heroics onboard. Coincidentally, I stumbled across the WaPo piece this morning shortly after reading this excellent Danger Room analysis of how Stan McChrystal and U.S. special operations learned to thwart Al Qaeda by adopting some of the group’s most effective organizational features — secrecy, adaptability, and extremely efficient networking, all in dramatic contrast to the military’s normal bureaucratic ways. Read that too if you can spare 10 minutes. McChrystal’s fire-with-fire approach was obviously by design whereas the Air Force’s similar approach to Flight 93 was by horrible necessity, but both are shining examples of American bravery and ingenuity in shifting tactics to confront an irregular threat. Keep it in mind this weekend.
WHOA!
Thank God for those folks on flight 93.
Scary...if true.
I saw him interviewed on TV. Can’t imagine having to really do something like that.
The F15s on ramp alert are not armed? Why the hell not?
Not Really. Intention of that flight had to be stopped. The passengers were going to die regardless.
Sonderkommando “ELBE”
The Germans actually studied the best spots to ram a B-17. One tactic was to chop off the tail with the propeller of a Bf-109 and then for the pilot to parachute out. If I was in her situation I would try to approach from the rear and use my wing to sever a wing on the airliner, and hope to parachute out. Of course, after downing an airliner filled with innocent civilians, I might not want to live.
What, his bird was unarmed?
Hopefully he had a plan to ram the jet and eject just before impact. Shit duty any way you look at it. God Bless and Keep those Americans that took matters into their own hands.
RIP
I'm still puzzled why active-duty soldiers, on base, aren't even allowed to carry side arms. That's how that swine Hassan was able to kill 13 people at Fort Hood. And you expect F15's on alert to be armed????
They were armed, but were concerned that a heat seeking missile would not stop a 4 engine plane. Thus she said:
“We don’t train to bring down airliners,” said Sasseville, now stationed at the Pentagon. “If you just hit the engine, it could still glide and you could guide it to a target. My thought was the cockpit or the wing.”
Thank God.... for pilots willing to do that..
I wonder if theres any FBI agents willing to “snitch” on their administrators..
You know with the LACK of FBI willingness to police the borders..
The LACK of the FBI in various implications of Cloward-Piven stands out..
Its almost like the FBI is complicit in Cloward-Piven(CP)..
CP is a direct assault on America government both Federal and State..
Wisconsin is one of the CP central headquarters.. especially the Unions..
Even the Police and Firefighter Union..
Before the libs made it a big deal most of my fellow Airmen were armed on base. Liberalism is destroying our Nation.
Sorry, but this sounds a lot like what people say after they have been bullied. You know how it goes, “I was gonna kick him in the teeth, but he got away”.
Wow. Not even sure he’d have enough time to eject. One in a million shot. Either way what a great sacrifice on a pilot’s part to save more lives by giving his own.
This wasn’t a playground.
Americans 'reported' for duty that day - so many to be proud of - thanks for posting ...
Heather “Lucky” Penney comes from good flying stock. Her dad John Penney is one of the pilots that races Rear Bear. Has won the Reno race twice.
She also races
http://www.calgaryherald.com/news/Video+Major+Heather+Penney/5359961/story.html?cid=megadrop_story
From the article at WAPO The one thing she didn’t have as she roared into the crystalline sky was live ammunition. Or missiles. Or anything at all to throw at a hostile aircraft. Except her own plane. So that was the plan.
Ten years on, and I am always awed by the heroes of Flight 93 and never fail to get a lump in my throat!
"Let's Roll!
The two fighter jets were not armed, with anything. The full article states that events were happening too fast to arm all the planes, and these two were sent up with orders to find and stop Flight 93, regardless.
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