F-15's Escorting Airliner to JFK right now.

Steyr

Fox News & Sky News just reporting a commercial passenger jet being escorted to landing in the US at JFK. A UAE flight from Yemen is reported to be scheduled at this time, but unclear if it is involved.

Steyr

Aircraft is Emirates 777, Flight is being escorted only due to Cargo on board. EK201 Dubai-JFK at 20000ft into descent.

Steyr

At the moment 81Miles out.

scudzilla

Live broadcast on Sky News now

Steyr

Listening to JFK TWR Now i believe thats here on Sky News TV.

Steyr

EK201 on the Ground.

scudzilla

IMO it's complete overkill on the Americans behalf.

Sure we'll see a lot of this in the coming weeks/months, then they'll say stuff like "This is why we can't reduce security at Airports"

APM

I'd love to know what the fighter jets would actually be capable of doing if the cargo did explode.

Typical US over-reaction

x in the city

they would also be taken out maybe :rolleyes:

SNAKEDOC

so as a person in charge what would you do. oh yea there is a plane on its way to one of my cities possibly with a bomb on board we'll just wait for it to land, no you take measures such as launching jets to shadow it and if necessary divert it by force to a safe area away from populated areas. it self preservation measures not over reaction. they had two towers brought down for Christs sake, wake up they are the biggest target in the world if they reduce security it will be open season on the states and then what happens for us, fuel prices go skyward along with everything else wee fork out more tax payers money implementing more stringent security and for what not doing more in the first place. for the sake of getting two f15's of the ground i say go for it. the more they do the less we pay in the long run.

Cessna_Pilot

scudzilla wrote: »

IMO it's complete overkill on the Americans behalf.

Sure we'll see a lot of this in the coming weeks/months, then they'll say stuff like "This is why we can't reduce security at Airports"

Agreed. Although I'll go a step further and say that I wouldn't be at all suprised if the Americans actually orchastrated this whole sham.

jmayo

SNAKEDOC wrote: »

so as a person in charge what would you do. oh yea there is a plane on its way to one of my cities possibly with a bomb on board we'll just wait for it to land, no you take measures such as launching jets to shadow it and if necessary divert it by force to a safe area away from populated areas. it self preservation measures not over reaction. they had two towers brought down for Christs sake, wake up they are the biggest target in the world if they reduce security it will be open season on the states and then what happens for us, fuel prices go skyward along with everything else wee fork out more tax payers money implementing more stringent security and for what not doing more in the first place. for the sake of getting two f15's of the ground i say go for it. the more they do the less we pay in the long run.

Ah FFs as someone else pointed out if one of the planned cargo packages had gone off how does two F15s flying alongside prevent it from plunging to earth resulting in anyone on board dying as well as the poor sods underneath.

Oh yeah they are going to divert exploding aircraft. :rolleyes:

If they really thought bomb was on baord why bring it anywhere near huge city and airport near huge city ?

Steyr

jmayo wrote: »

If they really thought bomb was on baord why bring it anywhere near huge city and airport near huge city ?

To be fair if you were that 777 Jockey would you listen to the Eagles or try to do something stupid??

jmayo

Steyr wrote: »

To be fair if you were that 777 Jockey would you listen to the Eagles or try to do something stupid??

Ah come on most pilots would not want to endanger people more people and cause many more civilian casulties by flying over very built up area.
If they really thought there was a major threat they would probably request diversion to nearest capable airfield that was not in major urban area or a major transit hub.

Are you hinting that the pilots of a Middle Eastern based airline would be more willing to do some more stupid that would risk more lives ?

sdanseo

jmayo wrote: »

If they really thought bomb was on baord why bring it anywhere near huge city and airport near huge city ?

The flight came in over the sea, landed on a runway which is built out into the atlantic. Well away from houses etc.

jmayo

sdonn wrote: »

The flight came in over the sea, landed on a runway which is built out into the atlantic. Well away from houses etc.

Fair enough if they can do that without transiting over built up area.

Still this whole thing sounds like overkill.

scudzilla

sdonn wrote: »

The flight came in over the sea, landed on a runway which is built out into the atlantic. Well away from houses etc.

Which would mean shit if it was a chemical bomb and the wind was blowing unfavourably

pclancy

They're dammed if they do something and dammed if they don't.

Shadowing potential threat airliners with fighters seems overkill and I don't really know what their purpose is at all except to destroy the airliner if it doesnt comply with instructions. If they did that queue international uproar about killing a plane load of civilians. If they don't do anything they look weak and give the potential for people to die on the ground as well as the air...catch 22 really.

I don't doubt for a second that one day a fighter jet is going to shoot down a threat airliner, its a just a matter of when. I also think that this is all just the tip of the iceberg, if they really wanted to bring down airliners or buildings again, they could do it if they tried, this is all probably just a test run.

Steyr

jmayo wrote: »

Fair enough if they can do that without transiting over built up area.

Still this whole thing sounds like overkill.

RAF Typhoon's were Scrambled to an AA Aircraft just at Irish Airspace while she was heading to LHR, nobody here seemed to think it was overkill, a disturbed person on board tried to rush the Cockpit.

jmayo

Steyr wrote: »

RAF Typhoon's were Scrambled to an AA Aircraft just at Irish Airspace while she was heading to LHR, nobody here seemed to think it was overkill, a disturbed person on board tried to rush the Cockpit.

And was there a disturbed person trying to access the cockpit on board this flight to JFK ?
If yes then fine have fighter to make sure that if they get control that the airfact can be taken out before it is targetting some people on the ground.

But if this latest threat is bombs on board as cargo then there is shag all a fighter can do if a bloody great hole is ripped out of the hold.
Or would you like them to put a couple of more holes in it to be sure ?

And if it was AA flight would there not have been air marshals on board ?

SNAKEDOC

jmayo you'll have to qualify your statement that having two f15's shadow a suspect plane to an airport as overkill. your statement has no place whatsoever. why wouldn't they escort the plane. just look at our garda force when a plane declares an emergency at least 15 patrols are immediately dispatched to the airport not to mention the fire service both fire brigade and airport service. then there is the ambulance service too. so as the US has the ability to let two f15's shadow it why not. its their way of dealing with an emergency or do you not class a plane with a possible bomb on board as an emergency. What if the bomb had detonated but didn't destroy the plane as is very probable and rather than risk the plane coming down on a school bring it down themselves. there are a thousand reasons to have those planes up but mostly its for the reasons people can't think of. as a good country man once said to me "rather be lookin at them than for them"

jmayo

SNAKEDOC wrote: »

jmayo you'll have to qualify your statement that having two f15's shadow a suspect plane to an airport as overkill. your statement has no place whatsoever. why wouldn't they escort the plane. just look at our garda force when a plane declares an emergency at least 15 patrols are immediately dispatched to the airport not to mention the fire service both fire brigade and airport service. then there is the ambulance service too. so as the US has the ability to let two f15's shadow it why not. its their way of dealing with an emergency or do you not class a plane with a possible bomb on board as an emergency. What if the bomb had detonated but didn't destroy the plane as is very probable and rather than risk the plane coming down on a school bring it down themselves. there are a thousand reasons to have those planes up but mostly its for the reasons people can't think of. as a good country man once said to me "rather be lookin at them than for them"

Does your shift key not work or have you ever heard of a capital letter at the beginning of a sentence or even the odd line break ?
I know some will accuse me of pedantry, but I find it desperately hard to read your post.

Back to actual content of post...
So in you scenario if the bomb didn't bring the plane down you would have the F15s hit it with a missile or two to make sure it fell somewhere that wouldn't cause too much damage to anything or anyone on the ground ?
AFAIK the primary use of fighter aircraft has been to escort commerical traffic that either appears to have threat of hijacking or has lost voice communications and thus is not contactable.
Were either of these two scenarios at play ?

Anyway it was great show of force and probably got all the milmos wetting their pants, so maybe it will scare Al-Qaeda or whoever so much they will not try anything ever again. :rolleyes: