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My grandfather was almost shot down at the White House (2018)

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Re: My grandfather was almost shot down at the White House (2018)

#181

Post by bdhess »

prottog wrote: post #151
jancsika wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The fact that we continually shift more power from Local / State government, then from Congress to the Executive is the exact reason the president is a "Symbol of Power" This is all rank and dubious speculation wrt your general rule about POTUS needing a dedicated security team. Hell, Duane Johnson needs a dedicated security team. If you are positing a federal government so weak that POTUS is not widely known withi…

What part of GP's take on the American federalist system are you describing as radical? Seems to me that the truly radical thing is what the federal government has morphed into over the years, its founding constitutional document notwithstanding.

The government changed because the nation changed. It's now the richest country in the world, with a population of 330 million people, and spans an entire continent from ocean to ocean. Even if you just consider the constitutional commander-in-chief duties, whoever holds the role is going to be a person of global importance.

Re: My grandfather was almost shot down at the White House (2018)

#182

Post by quest88 »

tjohns wrote: post #140
jcrawfordor wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a fairly common instruction from a controller in my experience, at least when dealing with small aircraft that they know are flying VFR. Traditional VFR navigation ("pilotage") is mostly based on finding landmarks anyway. Flying in another city with a runway pointed towards a river, "turn after the river," "report crossing the river" are common instructions. Other landmarks popular with controllers include th…

Indeed. Popular landmarks used by ATC in the SF Bay Area include a sunken ship in the middle of the bay, a (particularly large) church, a community college, an AT&T telephone office, the KNBR antenna, and major freeways. Among others. It's different when flying IFR, but pilotage is an important part of VFR navigation. It's also worth noting there's an IFR visual approach plate for DCA that basically says the same thi…

Don't forget Embassy Suites! Ha.

Re: My grandfather was almost shot down at the White House (2018)

#183

Post by quest88 »

itslennysfault wrote: post #43
godshatter wrote: post #25

Shouldn't the dispatcher have given more precise directions than "follow the river"? If they had said "take a right and follow the river", this wouldn't have been a problem. I suppose they were used to professional pilots knowing what was meant, but they were already working to fit a small plane into a larger system presumably filled with mostly larger jets from commercial airlines that flew in and out of that airpor…

Honestly, I'm surprised by "follow the river" as a flight instruction. That sounds like the directions you'd get from someone that doesn't understand cardinal directions. "Turn right at the gas station, then turn left at the big oak tree" or something. I have no experience with flying, but I assumed it would be a heading / cardinal direction and not "turn right at [landmark]"

Nah it's pretty common. When I take people around the golden gate bridge ATC tells me "Remain west of the 101 / Keep the 101 off your right at or below 2,000". And then later "Remain north and west of bay bridge".

Re: My grandfather was almost shot down at the White House (2018)

#184

Post by alistairSH »

donatj wrote: post #160
jamesmoroni wrote: post #158

I had a similar experience in 2008. I was an Air Force helicopter pilot stationed at Andrews Air Force Base just outside DC. I got a last-minute assignment to show a new copilot some of our operating sites on the north side of DC. One of those sites was Camp David. I read through the NOTAMS but didn't notice that the large restricted area around Camp David was active that day because the president was there. So we to…

Can you explain for the layman what it means to lose your wings?

Aviators (military) get a pin to indicate they’re pilots. The pin is usually two bird-like wings with an emblem in the center.

Losing ones wings would be having the pin (figuratively) removed and losing permission to fly.

Re: My grandfather was almost shot down at the White House (2018)

#185

Post by Merad »

godshatter wrote: post #25

Shouldn't the dispatcher have given more precise directions than "follow the river"? If they had said "take a right and follow the river", this wouldn't have been a problem. I suppose they were used to professional pilots knowing what was meant, but they were already working to fit a small plane into a larger system presumably filled with mostly larger jets from commercial airlines that flew in and out of that airpor…

Not a pilot so I don't know if they'd use that language today, but there have been more than a few lessons written in blood over the years regarding ambiguous/unclear ATC communications. For example the worst air disaster ever occurred in part because a controller gave the instruction (paraphrasing), "cleared to beacon after takeoff." It was intended only as instructions to be followed after takeoff, but the pilot interpreted it as, "you are cleared to takeoff, then follow these instructions." The airport was under heavy fog at the time so he couldn't see the plane that was taxiing and hadn't cleared the runway yet. Two 747s collided and nearly 600 people died.

Source: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tenerife_airport_disaster

Re: My grandfather was almost shot down at the White House (2018)

#186

Post by alistairSH »

otikik wrote: post #27

One of the things that surprised me when I flew (as a passenger) a practice flight on a coworker’s Cessna was the constant radio chat between ground and all the airplanes. There were like 4 planes doing practice runs like us. It was constant chitchat. I can’t imagine the noise in a big comercial airport. I am sure there’s many good reasons for that system, figured out by people smarter than me with much more experien…

With commercial airlines, there’s 2+ pilots in the cockpit. So, they share flying, radio, etc responsibilities. And ATC splits various phases of flight operations across several radio frequencies (ground, departure, etc).

And once you’ve listened to enough ATC radio, there are patterns and cues. If ATC wants to talk to somebody, they call them by flight number, etc.

But, yeah, listening to a busy airport is confusing for anybody who isn’t an experienced pilot.

Re: My grandfather was almost shot down at the White House (2018)

#187

Post by alistairSH »

dncornholio wrote: post #19

I have a feeling the person who made the call was trying to intimidate him. I'm fairly sure no jet was being scrambled or anti-air was being aimed for a small plane that made a wrong turn..

Scrambling jets to intercept planes that wander into no-fly zones is a regular occurrence at DCA (the military craft usually launch from Andrews AFB, or possibly a local USCG station for rotorcraft).

Not uncommon at other airports where POTUS is a regular, airports with other VIPs (NYC area), major sporting events (no fly around the Super Bowl stadium). DCA has a permanent zone, the others are temporary and communicated via NOTAM.

Re: My grandfather was almost shot down at the White House (2018)

#188

Post by alistairSH »

godshatter wrote: post #31
dncornholio wrote: post #19

I have a feeling the person who made the call was trying to intimidate him. I'm fairly sure no jet was being scrambled or anti-air was being aimed for a small plane that made a wrong turn..

We don't know what might have been going on at the White House at that particular time though. Was the President having a press conference, for example?

Doesn’t matter, DC has permanent restrictions (much smaller when this occurred, larger and more restrictive post-9/11).

Re: My grandfather was almost shot down at the White House (2018)

#189

Post by alistairSH »

boringg wrote: post #36

I feel like there has to be a lot of stories similar to this where people got really close to getting shot down. Rare but not completely uncommon .. or is this truly a unique story?

It’s a normal, but infrequent, occurrence in locations where POTUS or other VIPs are frequently located. DC has permanent restrictions. Camp David temporary restrictions when POTUS is in residence. Restrictions are also placed around major sporting events (Super Bowl), though I’m not sure if those are for fear of somebody dive bombing the stadium or for the other reasons (events often have military fly-bys, parachute displays, etc).

I’ve listened to a few intercepts on the radio. They don’t shoot without a good bit of verification. Typically, the lost pilot gets a hint when they see the F-16 fly across their nose, or a USCG helicopter flies alongside, or ATC finally gets through to them.

Re: My grandfather was almost shot down at the White House (2018)

#190

Post by jen20 »

phpisthebest wrote: post #176
dctoedt wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I certainly don't dispute that the federal government is vulnerable to regulatory capture by rent-seekers. But if you imagine that state- and local governments are any different, you must live in a laudably-different place than do most of us.

I dont imagine them to be different, I imagine 1. A Single vote in a smaller political division carries more weight than being diluted in a large nation like the US at the national level. 2. If the local rent seeking becomes too harmful it is far less costly to relocate to a new City, County, or State than it is to immigrate to a new nation 3. It is infinitely more costly for a large corporation to rent seek thousand…

It’s clearly not infinitely more costly. There aren’t infinite states. I doubt it’s even 50 times more costly.
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