Sources: Plane intercept near White House not timely

CNN ^ | June 20, 2002 Posted: 1:32 PM EDT (1732 GMT)

[RoughDobermann]

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Administration sources tell CNN that two U.S. Air National Guard F-16s were not able to intercept a small plane that violated restricted air space around Washington until more than 10 minutes after the Cessna 182 passed near the White House.

[Shermy]

So, are they going to give us the info on the pilot of the small plane? "Arab sounding name?" "Drunk congressman?" - I go for the latter.

[RoughDobermann]

The pilot and a passenger were taken into custody for questioning by federal authorities, Bell said. Their names and ages are being withheld by the FBI, which is handling the investigation.

[lsee]

How about anti-aircraft guns on the roof...that might work...

[timestax]

They better be faster than that for Petes' sake!

[RoughDobermann]

Well, it is rumored that the SS have MANPADs...

[Redcloak]

Abdul Aziz bin Islamisareligionofpeace?

(Just a guess.)

[Shermy]

Their names and ages are being withheld by the FBI, which is handling the investigation.

Male, middle-aged high-ranking government official and his female, twentyish "Personal Assistant"?

[Wright is right!]

"Their names and ages are being withheld by the FBI, which is handling the investigation."

"However, their names have a LOT of consonants and weird vowel combinations. Their beards make determination of their ages difficult. And they appear to be wearing big bunches of Handi-Wipes on their heads. Other than that, we cannot say whom they are."

Michael

[Aquinasfan]

How about anti-aircraft guns on the roof...that might work...

And an Apache helicopter.

[bvw]

Just put a a couple of harrier jets on the ground near the Federal Triangle?

[jae471]

What's needed is a bigger buffer zone

Bigger Buffer Zone? The buffer zone extends halfway to Baltimore as it stands now. Why not declare of Maryland and Virginia a buffer zone.

Note key landmarks:
Reagan National (blue-green circle in center of red circle)
Capitol/Mall (Shaded rectangle-ish box above Reagan) White House (Shaded circle NW of Capitol/Mall)
Andrews AFB (blue-green bars to right of Reagan)
BWI (blue-green "toothpicks" in upper right corner)

The purple circles are smaller local airfields.

[FreeTheHostages]

Actually, FYI, the planes were where they were supposed to be 11 minutes after Norad was contacted. The CNN website gives the time breakdown, and our boys were on strip alert and up in their planes less than 3 minutes after being given the word. So nothing's slow once our fighter pilots find out about it. They're not the problem. I still want to know why it took NORAD 3 precious minutes to call Andrews Air Force Base. That makes NO sense.

[FreeTheHostages]

Timeline:
7:59 p.m. Cessna enters "restricted" air space
8:03 p.m. FAA notifies NORAD
8:04 p.m. Cessna enters "prohibited" air space
8:06 p.m. Two F-16s get orders to scramble
8:06 p.m. Cessna passes White House "within a few miles"
8:17 p.m. F-16s take off from Andrews AFB
Intercept occurs "a few minutes later."
Source: Senior administration official

[FreeTheHostages]

correction to my posting above: they were up 13 minutes, not 3 minutes. did the math wrong.

[Wright is right!]

"Administration sources tell CNN that 'No matter how fast we got there, you'd still manage to find something wrong with it.'"

That is the appropriate quote. This interview will appear in an hourlong special now in production entitled, "Wise And All-Knowing CNN Exposes Your Stupid Military And Its Neanderthal Buttwipes."

I don't know why they don't just move the entire operation to Qatar and give Big Al and His Screaming Jazeeras a run for their money. They certainly don't like it here in the US.

Michael

[genefromjersey]

Gee ! Many thanks to CNN for alerting all potential terrorists to a potential "hole" in White House security !

Fortunately, Islamic militants, who might otherwise use CNN to gather battlefield intelligence, have been too busy protesting alleged profiling for the revelations to matter...

[Political Junkie Too]

So, are they going to give us the info on the pilot of the small plane? "Arab sounding name?" "Drunk congressman?" - I go for the latter.

Maybe it was Al Gore. After all, they did search him twice at the airport a few weeks ago. They must have been suspicious of something if they went to all the trouble to search him -- twice.

-PJ

[Wright is right!]

On the sectional, what's the notch cut-out on the right side of the prohibited area?

Interesting that the prohibited area extends all the way to Dulles - that's a bigger zone than I'd imagined. A lot of the No-Go zone I would have thought was Restricted.

Michael

[Orangedog]

How about anti-aircraft guns on the roof...that might work...

Hard to tell what is fact or BS, but I have heard that the SS has Stingers for just such an event. The only problem that I would see is being able to get a good lock on the target. The stinger is a heat seeker and Cessnas don't put out that much heat, when compared to the type of aircraft that it was designed to shoot down. It would be tragic if the missile lost it's lock on the plane and ended up going for the first hot-dog cart between the plane and the White House roof ;) A 50 cal would be a good choice. A Vulcan machine gun would also be on my short list of must-have items.