Maverick: Tower, this is Ghost rider requesting a flyby.
Air Boss Johnson: That’s a negative Ghost rider, the pattern is full.
Let me just start this off by saying that this blog post won’t be as funny as Tom Cruise’s “Maverick” and Anthony Edwards’ “Goose” having their way with control towers in “Top Gun.”
On Monday morning, I received a frantic voice mail from my mom on my work number, just moments after she left a message on my cellphone, asking if everything was okay. Having no idea what she was so concerned about, and why she was calling about “what was happening” in the NYC area, I rang her back, only to learn that someone she works with received a phone call from a friend who’d just run out of their building in Jersey City’s financial district, on the Hudson River right across from NYC’s financial district, after a large plane along with a fighter escort was flying very low over the area. Nothing was on the news, nothing was online, except for half a dozen people on Twitter, including the WFMU radio station.
@WFMU: Commercial jet is circling very low above WFMU / Jersey City, being escorted by single fighter plane. Has circled 3 times already. wtf?
As someone who’s lived in some portion of New Jersey that planes fly above or along for his whole life, you have a pretty good handle on where the planes are or aren’t supposed to be. That, of course, has been exacerbated by the post-9/11 observations of people, who are probably paying attention slightly more than they ever did before that sunny September day. Shortly thereafter, the WSJ (among others) reported that it was actually just a photo op.
Are you kidding me?
As it turns out, there wasn’t any kidding involved. NYC’s Mayor Bloomberg, among others, were not happy. I’m gonna presume that the hundreds (thousands) of workers that evacuated their buildings weren’t happy either.
Now I don’t mean to be overly-sensitive, but if this was supposed to be a test or something like that (which it wasn’t), you’d think maybe people in the government would be smart enough to tell the necessary parties (apparently the NYPD, among others, knew), and that they’d at least have the ability to grasp that someone might overreact or react the way they did today when the large plane and military escort flew far lower than planes normally do?
Of course, it didn’t seem like anyone had their stuff together. Government fail.
@tombiro: White House with no comment on the military directing press to talk with White House about this morning’s plane incident. Redirected back.
Here’s my favorite part from today’s White House press briefing where press secretary Robert Gibbs had an interesting time answering questions about the flyover.
Q It doesn’t — it’s not a concern at all to the administration that you don’t have your person there and then they don’t have their people there? Not at all?
Second question, do you guys feel you owe folks in New York City this morning an apology for this incident having to do with the airplane that looks like Air Force One with two fighter jets? There seemed to be a lot of panic –
MR. GIBBS: I would point you to the FAA or Air Force.
Q Everybody’s pointing us to the White House Military Office, so that’s why –
MR. GIBBS: Well, then I would contact the White House –
Q Well, the White House Military Office won’t tell us anything — they’ll refer us to you. (Laughter.)
MR. GIBBS: Well, then let me go discuss with the White House Military — I don’t — I have seen some news reports but –
Q What was the photo op for?
MR. GIBBS: I don’t know. That’s — I have no information on this other than what I saw –
Q I mean, I understand the way this works. I’m just saying, appearance-wise, it’s odd that you guys don’t have a response. I mean, this is the President’s aircraft or what looks like –
MR. GIBBS: I understand. I was working on other things. You might be surprised to know I don’t know of every movement of Air Force One or what happens to it. But I will certainly talk to the Military Office.
At least Monday is over. And you can thank “Top Gun” for the quote. And John for using it regularly.