On Thu, 26 May 2005 06:24:14 -0000, Skywise
wrote in
::

Larry Dighera wrote in
:
Snipola
Officials from the Federal Aviation Administration and Customs and
Border Protection confirmed the communications problems cited by
the Cessna pilots, Hayden "Jim" Sheaffer, 69, and Troy Martin, 36,
both of Pennsylvania. The frequency was unavailable in that patch
of airspace, the officials said.
Snipola

I'm sorry, but how can a frequency be "unavailable in that patch
of airspace"?!?! If the transmitter and the receiver can tune to
the frequency, it's available unless it's already in use or being
jammed.

Other reports have indicated that 121.5 MHz was in use by an
unidentified ELT signal at the time communications were attempted.

If you ask me, the fact that the gov't screwed up in trying to
communicate to the errant aircraft indicates the system DID NOT
WORK.

If our government is going to put pilots in their deadly cross hairs,
their policies must be infallible. This intercept policy is flawed,
as demonstrated by this incident.

[...]
They need to shelf the idea of
shooting down little airplanes and seriously rethink their
strategy before somebody gets needlessly killed.

That is blatantly obvious to me also.

Hmmm...another thought...what if a learjet went zipping through
the DC ADIZ? It'd be long gone before the scardy-cats in DC could
even zip up their pants!!!

Right. I believe the ADIZ was implemented to reduce radar clutter, so
that an intruding aircraft is more easily spotted; it can then be
dealt with by ground based fire. The effectiveness of such a security
policy is dubious at best, and pathetically ineffective in fact.

BTW, I'm not defending the cessna pilots at all. Just pointing
out that mistakes have been made on BOTH sides.


Right.