President Obama tried to look a little more presidential by playing a little fast and loose with the truth. And the Allied Pilots Association called him on it.
Here’s what the President said in his comments about the would-be Christmas airline bomber:
First, I directed that we take immediate steps to ensure the safety of the traveling public. We made sure that all flights still in the air were secure and could land safely. We immediately enhanced screening and security procedures for all flights, domestic and international. We added federal air marshals to flights entering and leaving the United States. And we’re working closely in this country, federal, state and local law enforcement, with our international partners.
Not so fast there, buckeroo. Turns out the Allied Pilots Association thinks the president is taking off on, shall we say, flights of fancy. They disputed his comments in an official statement:
The Allied Pilots Association, which represents American Airlines pilots, says most airborne flight crews weren’t notified of the Christmas Day terrorist attack on a Northwest Airlines A330. The group is calling for changes after what it describes as “communications failures” left the majority of airborne flight crews in the dark about the attempted bombing. In a message to members, the APA’s security committee said the Transportation Security Administration specifically told airlines to notify only the crews of airborne westbound trans-Atlantic flights of the attack on the Northwest flight on approach to Detroit. “The TSA should have mandated that information about this security event be passed on to all airborne flights,” says the message, which was passed to AVweb by a reader. The note says American complied with the directive but the APA says the airline should have told all of its in-flight crews of the incident “so that all of our captains would have been aware of the threat and could have made the proper adjustments to their in-flight security procedures.” The APA says it noted other communications failures in the chain of events.
The APA claims the initial notification of the incident came from the FAA and that the first direct contact between the airline and the TSA was about 12 hours after Umar Farouk Abdulmatallab allegedly injected an ignition substance into a package of PETN explosive sewn into his underwear. “Clearly, we have seen a large-scale communications breakdown concerning this terrorist event,” the note says. The APA says it has contacted the House Committee on Homeland Security with an eye toward making it policy that all airborne flight crews be notified immediately when there are serious security threats (Level 3 or Level 4). “It is essential in times like these that we act swiftly to ensure our crews are prepared to thwart any terrorist attack,” the association said.
Bottom line: The TSA only notified flights westbound for the United States, but no flights originating in the Unites States nor elsewhere.
In effect, it left hundreds of pilots flying blind. Because, apparently Janet Napolitano has already forgotten that homegrown terrorists like the Fort Hood shooter are out there.
Consider it more evidence that “the system worked.”
Source: National Review
