Passenger says she had "surgically implanted bomb"
 

US Airways B767 from CDG to CLT, 188 souls aboard, diverted to BGR with F-15 escort this afternoon. Allegedly, a female passenger claimed to have an explosive device implanted inside her body. Currently being evaluated for mental problems...


Plane diverted after crazed woman claims to have BOMB surgically implanted inside her body | Mail Online

According to this US Airways flight diverted after passenger claims to have device surgically implanted inside her | The Lookout - Yahoo! News she was traveling alone with no baggage. Wasn't necessarily a false alarm, but who knows?

This might be a tactic referred to as probing.

Might also be a nut job.

So what exactly was the job of the F15's? To shoot it down if she failed? Witness a human catastrophe? Put pressure on the crew? Answers on a postcard please.

PM

Like short range surface to air missiles in the middle of a city during the Olympics - it just seems it's part of the posture these days; no one knows what they are for.

Well, she could have been a decoy whilst others hijacked the aircraft and tried to fly it into a tall building?

In case she took command of the aircraft I suppose.

Rather the 188 PoB being taken out than another few hundred on the ground as well I guess?

Yeah - got it - might not crash on a big tall building. Otherwise perfectly OK to be shot down certainly killing everyone on the 'plane and the wreckage falling into a less publicity valuable area of housing or such.

Rubbish.

Piltdown:

Twofold:

1. To provide some measure of reassurance to the passengers that the diversion is being supported.

2. Once the captain and the F-15s are on the same page as to where the fight is diverting to, if the flight instead goes to some other plan, then the F-15 commander will be communicating as to "why are you doing that?" If there are no answers then the commander goes up the chain of command for instructions, possibly including shooting the airliner down.

Yeah - cos nothing reassures passengers quite like seeing the 'plane that will be tasked with shooting them down and nothing quite dissuades a suicide bomber...

Rubbish.

I thought heat seeking air to air missiles were only meant to destroy an engine. Of course, in a military type aircraft, the resultant engine separation is bad, but for a wing mounted engine, survivable? With the result of forcing a landing/ditching?
And carefully placed cannon rounds could also achieve a similar, less catastrophic result?
Maybe fighter escort has a useful role after all?

ONE:...very glad that BGR had portable stairs. Some guys would pull the slide trick.

Two...you guys and the F15's...imagine this: you are a bad guy hijacking a plane, you see one F15 pull up abeam the cockpit...you know you can't get away with flying into a building like 911. Two...for those of you in the know, the OTHER F15 is sitting on your tail just in case you try something funny.

Three...we have to face facts...it is better to lose 200 people on a plane than to lose 2000 in a "crash into a building" scenario...after all you will lose the 200 anyway!

Interesting ethical call that. Kill 200 of your citizens (& those of other countries) for certain with the wreckage falling god knows where (given by the time it is obvious it is going to hit a Very Important Building it'll be over a densely populated area anyway) or letting the 'plane carry on because you can't be certain there will be a happier eventuality.

Still Rubbish.

Not one convincing argument so far.

Do you happen to have any better ideas other than whining like a 12 year old? Geez... A valid argument is one thing ... Hope your just in a bad mood

The only possible reason to have a fighter jet hanging around is so the pilot can observe the manner the 'plane is flying in and possibly visually communicate with those on board.

The whole 'shoot down the hijacked airliner' idea it total BS. The idea that we would ever shoot down a 'plane load of innocent people because of what might happen is manifestly perverse and unethical.

There - that good enough?

It's been done before, ask Air India and others.

btw the ASRAAM I worked on in development starts off in infra red then reverts to 'flightdeck mode' if it becomes visual prior to impact, thus killing the pilots not just a shot into an engine. The database included civilian aircraft too!

OK load toad

what do you do? let thousands die or just hundreds? there really isn't another choice in the scenario you are thinking about.

how about the F15's fly directly in front of the engines of the 767 and then go to full afterburner, sucking the oxygen out of the air and causinga dual engine flameout on the 767? and then the 767 glides down and lands in a lovely park where hot dogs are being sold for twenty five cents.

they must be "Kosher hot dogs" though...:}

Maybe she had been b o o b y trapped...

Another act of psychological war/disinformation - for instance.

I can imagine the following possibility: after the "successful" shooting down some foreign TV broadcasts the terrorists' talk (recorder prior to the hijack): "We will hijack the plane. We want to exchange the passengers with the Guantanamo prisoners", ended with an obvious propaganda remark: "America killed its own citizens".

Next time they hijack the plane, a USAF guy in charge will have - supposedly - a much tougher decision to make...

Twas a decoy. The real bomb has already entered US jurisdiction in a sub chartered from the Cali cartell....:ooh:

Missing the point
 

U guys missing the point here. Every time one of these nut jobs come up with a new bomb solution it makes traveling that much more of a nightmare. Lets look at it in stages

1) 911 -- Any and every sharp object disappears, 1 hour additional security check and a no fly list

2) Shoe bomber: We now need to walk bare foot, un belted thru security

3) Liquid bomber: Little plastic bags with under 100 ml and god help you if you traveling with a kid you will be sucking from a bottle with a nipple at security to make sure it is milk

4) Undie bomber: Body scanners and last week I got a veggie at Amsterdam as the security guy yanked my undies as it seemed there was some metal in it.

5) So now with the implanted bombs what can we expect: A full colonoscopy?

I say bring back the Titanic much easier to sail.

Rubbish.

As far back as September 2001 the order was issued to USAF to shoot down any airliner that didn't respond to instructions, they would have done it then and they would do it today.

Airline security will no doubt be very tight, I suspect they are much more worried about the threat from light aircraft.

So when the terrorists have clearly communicated they are in complete control & are going to crash on a Very Important Building where do you shoot the airliner down & where does it fall? Having been travelling at 300 - 400 odd miles an hour & hit with one or more high explosive AA missiles travelling at supersonic speeds does it just fall in one piece in a convenient empty field?

If it's that far away from the VIB how does the govt decide the threat is going to be carried out successfully anyway.

Utter nonsense.

Let's just replay 9-11 for a second - at what point & where would the jets that hit the buildings have been shot down?

Don't know why they bother with airliners at all.
4 well placed homemade suitcase bombs in a large metropolitan hotel,
can bring down a massive building and kill thousands. No security, no hassles.

I'd do it that way.

Unfortunately politicians are often unethical and perverse, and the "we would never shoot down a plane load of innocent people" idea is BS.

The 'funny' thing is, that the USAF had four opportunities to shot down a legitimate threat on 9 11, and we all saw the result. I agree with Load Toad, the 'shoot down civilian jet' policy is a bunch of BS that won't stop any terrorists (as seen on 9 11) but it does pose a very real threat of an overly confident politician/general ordering the shooting down of a jet, whose pilots switched the frequency a bit to early. It's simply an Orwellian method to remind people that we're at war.

Did she have a bomb?

At this point she appears to just be a nut job.

"At this time, there is no indication the plane or its passengers were ever in any actual danger."

Except, perhaps, from the F-15s.

"It doesn't appear to be any terrorist nexus at this point."

If this were probing, what would be gained by exposing herself?

Why do you all assume that the F15's "showed" themselves to the aircraft? More likely to sit behind/above/below unnoticed.

Why F15s?
 

Why go and have a look?

I guess the person in charge at North American Air Defense would appreciate a check that Captain X and FO Y look familiar from their passport photos as the aircraft nears his or her jurisdiction.

Should X & Y hear any loud bangs from the cabin and experience unusual handling, they might benefit from some outside eyes to explain what's going on.

And should the flight not arrive as agreed at Bangor, then the F15s will be able to ensure that it doesn't get as far as downtown Boston.

I had a girl with two huge "bombs" on my aircraft the other day...

we invited her over to the cockpit...=)

Actually that is the rubbish. Or at least a great distortion. There may now be a "principle" that the USAF has authority to shoot upon a civilian aircraft in a terrorist situation. Even in America this is a very long way from a standing order that non-responsive aircraft will be shot down!

It is a sad sign of the times, and an example of complete failure to understand and balance risks, that there is now a higher chance of a civilain aircraft being downed due to military screw-up than due to terrorism.

Remember, the US military have downed an innocent airliner before. Don't say it could never happen again. And the UK attitude towards protecting the Olympics is equally worrying and misguided posturing which increases rather than decreases risks.

There is an interesting medical parable for this. You would never create a vaccine to prevent a disease that kills one in a million. Why? Because the risk from the vaccine will invariably be higher than the risk from the disease.

Balance risks or posturing. Unfortunately governments will always chose posturing. They have to be seen to "have done everything possible".

bahrd

it is the stated position that the USA won't negotiate with terrorists , so trading the gitmo boys wouldn't fly

Wannabe FlyerThis is correct. Unfortunately, our respective governments, in their (misguided) mandates to ensure 100% of the population is 100% safe 100% of the time, are dancing to the "terrorists'" tune.

It comes down to the difference between tactics and strategy. Violence and/or the threat of violence is a tactic. The strategy is to disrupt and encumber our way of life, our freedoms and our economy. In that they are succeeding.

How would a surgically implanted bomb be detonated... GSM or manual detonation? If its a remotely detonated using GSM then retraining the passenger and sending fighter jets up will do nothing.

If its manual detonation, does the bomb carrier have a cable coming out of their body attached to a trigger?

All very confusing.

Load Toad:

Keep in mind this is America, the former home of the free and the brave. Since 911, that has been replaced by the Patriot Act.

The "government" whatever that is these days, doesn't want a plane flying into the government buildings in DC or any other place some four star general on duty deems important. They could not care less where the wreckage falls as long as it doesn't do what they don't want it to do.

But, as the country rapidly gets poorer this will all come to pass.

So if an airline was hijacked or there was a suspected terrorist threat onboard over British airspace the RAF wouldn't be sent up? The RAF would just sit back and let whatever was going to happen, happen? Get real. What the yanks did was no different to what the British, French, Germans, Italians, Spanish etc would do if there was a suspected threat.

Don't you all remember what happen a month ago? The RAF sent a Typhoon to intercept a bloody helicopter that squawked the wrong code. :ugh:

You're right. "I stand corrected" (too much B-movies).
Thanks.