I'd have been suspicious, too

http://www.washtimes.com/national/20061128-122902-7522r.htm

They claim they made an effort to book their seats away from each other as to not raise suspicion, but then they switch seats so they can be near all exits.

This one may not have been racial profiling, but a very good call by USAirways.

 

So, according to the story, the Imans switched seats so that they were near all the exits, asked for seat belt extenders and didn't use them and prayed loudly and mentioned Osama bin Laden.

If true, I wonder if they were hoping to get arrested so they could protest.

I also wonder why none of this came out when the initial stories were written.

Also, if you are sitting near the exit window or in first class, are you going to switch seats with an imam or tell him to get bent?

I would switch seats if someone wanted to sit next to a family member or something but not just for the hell of it.

 

yeah, sounds suspicious to me, too.

this kind of precaution is well worth a few weeks of bad publicity. frankly i often wish corporations would grow a pair and be more forceful in their comments. if what this article says is true, the airline should be aggressive with this and explain that its personnel will never hesitate to do the same thing if people act this way. that would make me more likely to fly USair if given a choice.

 

Here we go again.

 

Before it was all about praying. This is different, spnited.

If this story is true, it's at least a question of why such half-assed versions of the story were reported in the first place.

 

Assuming this is really the way it went down, you'd have to be insane not to do something.

 

Definitely different from the story reported last week...my guess is they were trying to get arrested to either sue or bring attention to a cause. Nobody is stupid enough to do all those things and not think they won't be removed from a flight. Now that a week has passed, i imagine that if they did have any connection at all with terrorists, authorities would have found it by now....these guys just seem to be attention whores (or maybe have just been living under a rock for 5 years)

 

Interesting story from a paper not noted for its objectivity.

Not a single on-the-record quote with attribution from anyone who was there. Lots of speculative stuff from former air marshals, and pilots from other airlines guessing about what they'd have done.

All the material cited from the crew or passengers sounds like it was cribbed from a police report, or the airline's internal investgation.

Sort of over the top without cause on all counts. Lots of logic conflict, too, i.e., if there were no seats available in first class, how'd those fellas wind up sitting there? Who trades down from a first class seat?

I'm inclined to trust very little of this until another news organization takes a crack at it.

 

And there's a bingo.
"Behavior associated with a terrorist probe."
You could fly the plane through the holes in that sentence. And let's see what happens when the anonymous sources have to talk under oath.
And I'd feel a lot better about it if it was coming from a reporter who hadn't bitten for this kind of stupidity before.
http://washingtontimes.com/national/20040729-111508-5912r.htm

 

Anonymous sources don't talk under oath, and neither do reporters who quote anonymous or confidential sources

 

What anonymous sources are you talking about? I guess I thought the stuff that went the furthest to damn last week's reports was what was taken from the police report. The anonymous sources were for the most part just saying "Uh, yup, I work on an airplane and that'd make me worry." I think the sources cited in the police report probably gave their names to the police, so they aren't exactly anonymous sources.

It was the police report that had the quote from the gate agent that said they were praying loudly, and the police report about the weird thing with the seat belt extenders, and the police report again that said they were talking about Bush and Osama and that stuff.

So if you're going to attack this story, I think there are only two ways: 1. Cast doubt that the reporter actually had a police report, and 2. Cast doubt that the police report is legit.

All the other stuff was just thrown in to add a little context, I thought. It seemed stupid not to include all their names, but I guess I understand why a pilot at another airline wouldn't want his name used. Seems you could find a retired guy though ... I don't know. I just didn't think those aspects were key to the point.

 

My point was that, in the inevitable lawsuit, some of these people are going to have to stand up and swear to this stuff. We'll see what happens. And, no, I don't trust Ms. Hudson or the WashTimes with this kind of story.