FWAAA

Apparently, JFK-LAS flight was diverted to Amarillo, Texas after captain came out of lav foaming at mouth and ranting about a bomb. Subdued by passengers, plane landed safely:

http://abclocal.go.com/wabc/story?se...ork&id=8597347

http://dfw.cbslocal.com/2012/03/27/j...srupts-flight/

sbm12

From one of the company's FaceBook pages:
From a bit earlier in the day:

ysolde

Wow. That is incredibly frightening. I'm glad no one was injured, and everything turned out all right.

Open Jaw

Crazy! You know all is going to badly when the FA ask paxs to tackle the pilot.

mrredskin

disappointed he didn't try shotgunning a couple of brews and flipping off everyone in the cabin, first.

enviroian

PTSD from serving in the middle east perhaps? Don't pilots go through psychological testing/screening on an annual basis?

I wonder how much this little snafoo will cost jetBlue.

dhuey

IIRC, there is a website that records all commercial flight communications with the control towers and centers. I'd be curious to hear the audio from this flight.

enviroian

Me too. Let me check over at airliners.net. Sounds like something they'd have posted.

LesPaul30

Forgive me for repeating from a closed thread... but,

Isn't this the flight number that most airlines will not use? 191? I had read previously that its very superstitious as its linked to tragic accidents on various airlines... Of course, its just coincidence it's making news again but interestingly enough! Thankfully not in the same scope as the previous ones...

FWAAA

Generally, airlines will not reuse a flight number that was involved in a disaster at that airline, but other airlines don't usually "retire" numbers from tragic flights at other airlines.

Case in point: AA's tragic flight 191 crashed in May, 1979 on takeoff from Chicago. In August, 1985, DL's flight 191 crashed in a tragic accident at DFW. Apparently, DL didn't retire the number after the AA crash. B6 apparently doesn't retire and refuse to use flight numbers that were involved in tragedies at other airlines.

adamj023

The whole situation is bizarre. Why? Because the plane was flying perfectly and there was no struggle in the cockpit but rather the Captain gets locked out after allegedly he goes to the bathroom as the story goes.

Then he says all these things about middle eastern nations and wars and the like. How do the passengers know the cockpit wasn't compromised.

Something is amiss, plus the other flight from Amarillo is in route right now and has not arrived.

Allegedly a security conference was going on in Las Vegas area.

Something just weird about this.

http://flightaware.com/live/flight/J...119Z/KAMA/KLAS

Remember this didn't happen till a bathroom break incident and the plane was flying perfectly the whole way. Only when there was alleged bathroom break and/or the plane got further into western usa airspace in a certain area did the event happen.

OPNLguy

There are so many versions of "the story" floating around (complete with contradictory information and incorrect assumptions) that it may well be a day or two before we all find out what REALLY transpired.

Incorrect information? One news item said the Captain had a medical issue and that the pilot-in-command diverted the aircraft to Amarillo. In truth, the Captain and the pilot-in-command are the same person. The other pilot is the co-pilot or first officer (F/O). Another story mentions the flight having multiple copilots, when there is only one. Still another story reports that an off-duty Captain took over, either in the air, or only once on the ground. It'll take a day or two for the truth to trickle down.

One of the things airlines train their pilots to look for are signs of what is called "incapacitation" and it comes in two flavors, "subtle" and "overt" (anything that isn't subtle). An example of subtle incapacitation is when while on an instrument approach in poor weather, should the one pilot (who is actually flying) not respond to altitude call-outs or other cockpit tasks uttered by the other non-flying pilot (who is monitoring everything) the non-flying pilot takes over the controls and aborts the approach/landing.

In the case of overt incapacitation, as its name implies, there's serious concern by one pilot over the other's behavior. Based on the fundamentals of what is known about 191's situation, at the very least it sounds as if the F/O had some seriousconcern about the Captain's behavior, assessed the behavior as a valid threat, and did the smart thing and got him out of the cockpit by whatever means he could. Once out, he was unable to get back in, and the F/O landed the aircraft all by himself, just as he would have if the Captain had theoretically had a heart attack and died in his seat. Many people think F/Os are not capable of doing everything a Captain can, but they are well-trained and just as much "real" pilots as the Captains are.

The general public may never know the real reason(s) why the Captain acted as he did here, and that's as it should be given medical privacy issues. What the traveling public should take comfort in is knowing that the possibilities of such events has been considered within training programs, and appropriate responses to such contingencies developed.

..and no, I don't work for jetBlue...

leonidas

Seems like the copilot handled it really well. Not easy to lock captain out. Poor fellow probably had a nervous breakdown from work related stress.

buckeyefanflyer

Tracking the flight on FlightAware, will be landing in LAS shortly, a very long day for the passengers.

Kagehitokiri

im surprised there isnt more discussion, i guess because jetblue?

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/trave...l#post18283946

there are at least 2 cell phone videos from onboard online