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CNN Saturday Morning News
Small Planes Frequently Meander Into Restricted Airspace
Aired January 12, 2002 - 07:12 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: A week ago, a 15-year-old student pilot's family was getting ready to celebrate his first night flight. Now they're planning Charles Bishop's funeral.
Bishop was the Florida boy who flew a stolen plane into a Tampa skyscraper last week. Authorities say he left a note behind voicing his support for Osama bin Laden.
We have some pictures taken by a U.S. Coast Guard helicopter crew just seconds after Bishop plowed into the Bank of America building. He flew over MacDill Air Force Base to get there. That's where U.S. Central Command is coordinating the war in Afghanistan, and it's restricted air space.
CNN's Kathleen Koch says small planes often wander into restricted air space, but these days it can have serious consequences.
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KATHLEEN KOCH, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): A troubled teen flies unchallenged over Tampa, Florida's MacDill Air Force Base, home to Central Command directing the U.S. campaign in Afghanistan.
CNN has learned such violations of off-limits air space are all too common, though usually unintentional.
Since September 11, the Federal Aviation Administration says pilots, 95 percent in small planes, have flown into restricted or prohibited air space 270 times. Some planes came too close to cities, outdoor sporting events, nuclear power plants.
Ten pilots flew over President Bush's Crawford, Texas, ranch. Forty-five flew too near the presidential retreat at Camp David.
Fighter jets have had to escort some violators to the ground.
LEE PEIGH, FREDERICK FLIGHT CENTER: We looked up in the traffic pattern, and the F-16 pulled up next to the fellow and dropped his gear, indicating to him that it was time to get on the ground.
MAJ. DEAN BREWER, WESTMINSTER CITY POLICE: The one F-16 pilot actually followed the small plane in and did a flyby down the runway at about 20 feet, and then climbed out. And it was a fairly impressive sight. UNIDENTIFIED WOMAN: (UNINTELLIGIBLE) T-40 prohibited area status.
KOCH: A flight with Maryland instructor Greg French shows why some pilots are going astray. Computer databases pilots use to navigate don't show some new and still temporary expanded no-fly zones, like the one around Camp David.
GREG FRENCH, FREDERICK FLIGHT CENTER: As they're flying, they can show that they're well clear of the earlier boundary three miles out.
KOCH: But the boundary is really eight miles out.
FRENCH: We are right along the very edge of the Camp David eight-mile perimeter right now.
KOCH: Few visual markers, only antennas on one border and a tower on the Camp David site.
Pilots have had to hand-sketch temporary off-limits areas on their maps.
JIM LAWSON, PRIVATE PILOT: The flight plan that you may have planned to follow one day could bring you right into one of those air spaces.
KEN HARDING, PRIVATE PILOT: Sometimes it can be confusing, and sometimes you do get a little concerned.
KOCH: Commercial jet pilots too are watching their routes.
CAPT. PHILLIP GROSHANG, AIRLINE PILOT: Now, with everybody in a wholly heightened -- different heightened state of awareness, you know, I'm not planning to wander off my route of flight anytime soon, I can tell you that.
KOCH (on camera): Some aviation security experts say the flight by the Tampa teen and the continuing violations show that it's impossible to keep all aircraft out of off-limits air space no matter how hard you try.
(voice-over): They want better tracking of private planes.
PAUL HUDSON, AVIATION CONSUMER ACTION PROJECT: We have to have beacons on small planes and a system of identifying the pilots that operate small planes. Presently we don't have that.
KOCH: And more security on the ground, like new FAA measures increasing supervision of student pilots, all to prevent the wrong person from getting into the cockpit, whether a terrorist or a troubled teen.
Kathleen Koch, CNN, Washington.
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