Hi all,
First, thanks to all for your concern and best wishes.
It really does confirm and enhance the sense of community I feel when I enter the arena or read/post on this board. We are, in a sense, "family", brought together by common interests, bound together by common experiences. This game creates a lesser bond than blood, but it creates a bond nonetheless.
I was flying a SFO-ATL redeye and got to the hotel in ATL at about 0600. This itself was a reroute of my trip, so my family really only had a general idea of where I was. I was sleeping when my wife tracked me down through Crew Sked to inform me that this attack had occurred and that my 77 year old Mother was maxxing out the blood pressure tests. My brother is flying International for US Air and was on his way back from Rome. Between knowing that the two of us were out flying, Mom was pretty stressed.
At present, I am sitting on my rear in ATL waiting to see what the plan will be. My brother is, I believe, enjoying the hospitality of the friendly Canadians in Gander that have opened their homes to the stranded crews and passengers. We only had a 3 second call from him saying "I'm OK."
If you Canadians will take it easy on him, we'd appreciate it. He really can't drink much.
Just informed that ATL will be shutdown for the rest of toady. Tomorrow brings what it brings. I am staying at the home of a very good fried from when I was based here. All very enjoyable except that his computer won't run AH.
Thanks again for your concern and best wishes.
<EDIT>: DC-9 Funked? Next you'll be calling me a stick and rudder monkey again!
I am on the 757/767 (Common Category).
Sadly, it's pretty obvious that a true "stick and rudder monkey" can cause a lot of trouble in a very short time.
I'll say this. I think a decent instructor with a week or two of time could probably teach the S&RM to do what those guys did with just Flight Sim 2000 and a good computer. Taking over the aircraft with the autopilot engaged, it would be a simple series of tasks to get them to program the autopilot to take them right to their targets and "take over visually".
Security must change, the cockpit doors must change and if we are indeed in a war with these guys, thought must be given to stationing a few protective "troops" (for lack of a better word) aboard each flight. It sounds crazy, but it is now confirmed that this is absolutely a crazy world.
[ 09-12-2001: Message edited by: Toad ]
