And to make sure that the story is true, I did I little checking first. CSPAN did an interview with the pilot. She talks about her experiences on 9/11. Yep, her mission was a kamikaze one
https://www.c-span.org/video/?300959-1/major-heather-penney-september-11-2001
Would the title have read “Male Fighter Pilot...’?
Awesome bump.
If the U.S. military couldn't scramble an armed fighter jet from Andrews Air Force Base to deal with a threat to the nation's capitol, then everyone in the Pentagon should have been lined up and executed the next day.
I’ve seen it ages ago on one of the many, many 9/11 documentary shows I record and watch religiously every year.
She was actually 1 of 2 from Andrews.
It’s another compelling story.
Courage in the air was strong that day.
Funny, she wasn’t mentioned in “Clear the Skies,” a great documentary about the pilots and FAA that day. Doesn’t mean she isn’t the real deal, I just wondered why they missed her?
This is strange.
There was not one fighter pilot with ammunition available on 9/11???
That doesn’t sound right. If so - we need a new military command.
Well she is one person who can say her life was saved on 9 11 by passengers on flt 93. Everyone else would have been a hypothetical save.
Thanks.....kind of destroys those who claim that flight 93 was shot down by our fighters doesn’t it?
This does not pass the “smell” test.
Say it had no missiles, jet engines are very delicate. A few rounds from the cannons will take out the engines. The jet will go down without engines. No missiles required.
The added plus to this approach is that despite repeated warnings, watching your jet engines explode 1 by one is a remarkably convincing argument.
PING!
I think she had a decent chance. The Luftwaffe created a ramming squadron to go after bombers. They took down around 20 bombers and had a slightly better than 50% survival rate. And that’s without ejection seats.
Not counting the KIAs who got out, but that we shot as they hung in parachutes.
>> because equipping the plane with missiles would require too much time.
More important than the pilot’s gonads.
Thanks for posting. I had not heard this story.
I ask, “Why were unarmed fighters protecting President Bush’s plane at this crucial time?” Does that mean there were no armed planes close by at McDill, Eglin, Tyndall, NAS Pensacola, huh??
IMHO if that situation had arisen, a test pilot would have tried to divert the plane but, failing that, he would have flown in just in front of the airliner and dumped fuel. Pretty certainly that would cause an engine flameout. Repeat on the other side, and the plane is a glider. Repeat in the middle, and the windshield becomes opaque. I seriously doubt the airliner reaches and finds its target.
. . . and then maybe shut up about it, to avoid liability.