New Yorkers still startled by low flying jets, seven years later
A plane performed a fly over of lower Manhattan escorted by two fighter jets in what federal officials are describing as a planned photo op. The incident caused some panic amongst office workers and people on the street, and caused a series of offices to be evacuated in both downtown Manhattan and Jersey City, NJ.
FAA spokesman Jim Peters stated that the photo op being conducted with the two F-16 fighter jets and Boeing 747 (an Air Force One backup place) was a previously coordinated event. President Obama was not on board, thus the plane did not have the ‘Air Force One’ designation.
Despite claims that this was a coordinated event, Governor Jim Corzine is stating he had no advance warning of the mission, and has not found a NJ official who was aware of it. Mayor Bloomberg similarly was unaware, however City Hall Deputy Marc Mugnos was informed and was later reprimanded for failing to pass the message on to the mayor. Perhaps more strangely the NYPD was informed, but told not to make it public. They did however authorize 911 operators to inform those that called in that this was a known military mission.
President Barak Obama noted that the incident was “a mistake” and that he did not have previous knowledge of the fly-by plans. The White House military director who authorized the mission for creating souvenir photographs, Louis Caldera, issued an apology for the incident. A previously scheduled photo-op for May over Washington D.C. has since been cancelled.
Opinions range from this being a misunderstanding to calling this a big mistake. Further congress members have called into question tax payer dollars funding such missions, including comments made by Senator John McCain: “Air Force One flight over NYC, how much $ did it cost the taxpayers? Stay tuned…” via Twitter.
Given a few key factors:
- Needlessly causing panic.
- Demonstrating poor disaster communications with local government officials.
- Tying up 911 rather then proactively advising people.
- Creating unplanned downtime for companies in lower Manhattan and Jersey City.
…this rates as a non-disaster disaster. Further it appeared form the ground, as shown in the video, that a 747 was being chased by a fighter jet, an alarming site for any New Yorker.
References
Interestingly, the term “no fly zone” has no legal meaning in US aviation, the term is “prohibited area”. You can see which areas are so designated here: http://sua.faa.gov/.
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Filed Under: Disaster Recovery
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