Matthew
Touchdown! Greaser!
Back in May (the 19th) I posted my first solo experience.
That was the day of the attempted hijacking at my airport.
A recap in 200 words or less:
A guy with a t-shirt that said 'Show me the money' and a Glock .40 walked into the local bank, robbed the place, made the employees and customers strip to their underwear, flex-cuffed and chained 6 hostages together, walked as a group to the parking lot, piled into a minivan, had one of the hostages drive, started shooting out the windows at the cops, headed east the 2 miles to the airport with every cop in town on his tail, drove into the airport, onto the ramp, grabbed one of the women hostages, dragged her to a 172 that was doing a run up and tried to open the left door.
Then the time compression began - the police car dashboard video and TV helicopter video show that (within 1-2 seconds) the CFI pulls the mixture, CFI/student dive out the right door, hostage breaks loose and ducks under the tail, and the shooting starts.
Aircraft in the pattern are allowed to land, then the airport is closed.
This is the day I'm scheduled to solo. I got to the airport later that day, just after the airport reopened. The runup area on the east side of R18 still had crime-scene tape and police cars around it, I was using the west side of R18. All the reporters doing their talking head remotes like to set up so they can get a picture of an airplane in the background. That would have been me doing my solo.
Anyway, the guy has been in a prison rehab hospital ever since. He plead guilty yesterday. He had been 'stressed out' because of the loss of his job and needed the money to open a restaurant. He's likely to be sentenced to 10 yrs for the robbery, 7 yrs on weapons charges, and 20yrs for attempted air-piracy, minimum. Probably not bad, considering the district attorney and the feds ran out of books to throw at him.
I just hope the press isn't out to record my checkride, too.
That was the day of the attempted hijacking at my airport.
A recap in 200 words or less:
A guy with a t-shirt that said 'Show me the money' and a Glock .40 walked into the local bank, robbed the place, made the employees and customers strip to their underwear, flex-cuffed and chained 6 hostages together, walked as a group to the parking lot, piled into a minivan, had one of the hostages drive, started shooting out the windows at the cops, headed east the 2 miles to the airport with every cop in town on his tail, drove into the airport, onto the ramp, grabbed one of the women hostages, dragged her to a 172 that was doing a run up and tried to open the left door.
Then the time compression began - the police car dashboard video and TV helicopter video show that (within 1-2 seconds) the CFI pulls the mixture, CFI/student dive out the right door, hostage breaks loose and ducks under the tail, and the shooting starts.
Aircraft in the pattern are allowed to land, then the airport is closed.
This is the day I'm scheduled to solo. I got to the airport later that day, just after the airport reopened. The runup area on the east side of R18 still had crime-scene tape and police cars around it, I was using the west side of R18. All the reporters doing their talking head remotes like to set up so they can get a picture of an airplane in the background. That would have been me doing my solo.
Anyway, the guy has been in a prison rehab hospital ever since. He plead guilty yesterday. He had been 'stressed out' because of the loss of his job and needed the money to open a restaurant. He's likely to be sentenced to 10 yrs for the robbery, 7 yrs on weapons charges, and 20yrs for attempted air-piracy, minimum. Probably not bad, considering the district attorney and the feds ran out of books to throw at him.
I just hope the press isn't out to record my checkride, too.