US airline worker steals plane, takes it for flight before crash
San Francisco, August 11
A “suicidal” mechanic stole an empty passenger plane from the Seattle-Tacoma airport, took it for a brief flight that included an aerial loop, and then crashed it. Officials said the incident was not related to terrorism.
He died when the plane crashed after a 90-minute "joy ride". Two military F-15s were scrambled to chase the stolen plane, but “were not involved in the crash”, local officials said.
Video recorded by a bystander late on Friday showed the passenger airplane making an unlikely upside-down loop, then flying low over Puget Sound before crashing into the sparsely populated Ketron Island in Washington.
The crash sparked a fire in the dense forest. Flames lit up the night as they spread from the burning wreckage to nearby trees. Officials said there were no victims on the ground. The stolen plane was a twin engine turboprop Q400 airplane belonging to its sister carrier Horizon Air, Alaska Airlines said on Twitter. It normally carries 76 passengers.
“This is not a terrorist incident,” Ed Troyer with the Pierce County Sheriff’s office wrote on Twitter.
The plane thief “is confirmed a suicidal male,” Troyer wrote. “We know who he is.” The suspect was identified as a 29-year-old airline mechanic and local resident who “acted alone,” Troyer added, confirming that there were “no passengers on the plane” when it crashed.
The sheriff’s office also said that the F-15s arrived minutes after the plane was stolen and kept the aircraft “out of harms way and people on ground safe.” Horizon Air chief operating officer Constance von Muehlen issued a video statement describing the incident.
“We believe it (the plane) was taken by a single Horizon Air employee and no other passengers or crew were on board,” she said. “Our hearts are with the family of the individual aboard as well as all of our Alaska Air and Horizon Air employees.” The plane was stolen around 8 pm (0300 GMT Saturday) and crashed 90 minutes later, officials said.
The pilot, identified as “Rich,” comes across as excitable, confused, and even apologetic in a conversation with the control tower. Pierce County Sheriff Paul Pastor described the incident at a press conference as a “joyride gone terribly wrong”. — AFP.
‘Broken guy, got a few screws loose’
- The mechanic told air traffic controllers that he was a “broken guy” but also joked about whether the airline would hire him as a pilot if he landed safely
- Identified as “Rich”, the man told air traffic controllers that said he didn’t want to land at a nearby military base. “Those guys will rough me up if I try and land there.” During another part of the exchange, he said he was concerned that he was going to run low on fuel
- “I have got a lot of people who care about me. I don’t want to disappoint them but that I am just a broken guy, got a few screws loose, I guess,” he had said before crashing
