United Flight 925

Here’s a hair-raising story (yes, even for baldy like me) regarding threatening behavior by middle eastern men on United Airlines flight 925; a transatlantic flight. The threatening behavior included:

• Several of the men had had no carry-ons.


• Once the flight was in the air, a flight attendant in the coach class cabin noticed a bag in the aisle. She asked that the owner of the bag identify him or herself at once. No one came forward to claim the bag. One of the late-arriving Middle Eastern men was seated nearby. The flight attendant asked the man pointedly if the bag was his. He replied "no" in English. Later, this same man approached the flight attendant and said that the bag in the aisle was his bag and that he wanted it back.


• the men evidently knew each other despite having paperwork that indicated that they came from different countries and arrived at the airport of departure (Heathrow airport) from different airports


• One of the men carried a hand-held mirror as he walked around the plane. According to one flight attendant, the man "was holding [the mirror] and moving it around so he could see what was going on behind him.


• the men had electronic gadgets with them that the flight crew couldn’t identify


• Captain radioed in to Heathrow airport, asking that the men's names be re-checked against the terrorist "no-fly" list. Word came back from the Captain to the crew that two of the nine men were on the "no-fly" list

Now I have read of these sorts of antic before. My opinion is that the terrorists are conducting research; probing the flight crew’s sensitivity to—and reaction to—various types of “unusual behavior”. That is logical. It is also consistent with al Qaeda’s methodical pre-terror attack preparations.

Anyway, the flight crew and the air marshals reacted correctly. The air marshals had their weapons below their blankets and the Captain requested that FBI meet the plane in Washington.

The part of this article that enraged me was United Airline ignored the captain’s orders.

But when the plane landed at the nation's capital, not a single law enforcement officer met the aircraft. No FBI, no Joint Terrorism Task Force (JTTF), no airport police. Instead, there was one United Airlines supervisor with a clipboard.

WTF?! What were these baboons on the ground thinking?

According to the flight crew, the Captain was furious. "The pilot went ballistic," said a flight attendant. "The Air Marshals went ballistic. The Captain had requested law enforcement -- two of those guys were on the "no-fly" list and they [United Airlines] disobeyed Captain's orders!"

Without a single law enforcement officer to question the men, all nine suspects -- two of whom were possibly a threat to national security -- walked off the plane and disappeared into the crowds.

Astounding. My mind reels at the utter incompetence and negligence of United Airlines.

Hat tip The American Thinker