PLANE CRASH in Greece: Bizarre circumstances, flying pilotless

[Bluebear]

A Cypriot airliner with 121 people on board from Larnaca, Cyprus, crashed Sunday on a mountain on the Euboea peninsula, northeast of Athens, a traffic controller at Athens international airport told

Just before the crash, an airport official said the plane appeared to be flying pilotless.

"The airport lost all contact with the plane which should have landed in the late morning, and two air force planes sent up in reconaissance found it flying above the Euboea peninsula, but they saw the pilots doubled up in the cabin," Iannis Pantazaratos said.

"We do not know how the plane is flying. It is being escorted by the military planes and the airport is in a state of emergency," said Pantazaratos, traffic control chief at Athens airport.

The Helios airlines plane was reported to be carrying 115 passengers and six crew.

http://www.africasia.com/services/news/newsitem.php?area=mideast&item=050814092214.klte5x74.php

=======

Rest in peace all passengers and crew. Could have been a hijacking or a rapid decompression with the pilots not donning oxygen masks in time. Very tragic.

[girl gone mad]

1. Dupe.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x1700450

[Bluebear]

2. Oh, I didn't think it was in another section of DU

Sorry.

[Swamp Rat]

3. Tragic

:(

[Bluebear]

4. Did you see asshole wants to allow knives & throwing stars on planes again

Poll numbers down, he must need another "incident against our freedoms" to "unite" us.

[Swamp Rat]

5. Watch, LaPierre of the NRA is gonna demand 2nd amendment rights

citing Israel's "EL AL." Why not let Minute Men on planes with machine guns, and allow kids to carry fireworks on board? :eyes:

I'm afraid Bush NEEDS another 9/11 very soon... will they roll out the new product in September? Or will it be mid August? They gotta beat Fitzgerald's investigation somehow.

[LiberalVoice]

6. When are we supposed to get the info...

as far as the Plaime case goes anyhow?

[Swamp Rat]

7. Most recent article I read:

Aug 13, 9:32 AM EDT
Career Lawyer Gets Oversight of CIA Probe

By MARK SHERMAN
Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON (AP) -- David Margolis, a lawyer at the Justice Department for 40 years, was named Friday to oversee a special prosecutor's investigation of who in the Bush administration disclosed the name of an undercover CIA officer.

Margolis, whose title is associate deputy attorney general, is taking the place of Deputy Attorney General James Comey, whose last day of work was Friday. Comey will be Lockheed Martin's new general counsel.

Comey made the designation of Margolis. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales has stepped aside from the probe because he was White House counsel when Valerie Plame's name was leaked in 2003 and he has testified to the grand jury investigating the unauthorized disclosure.

Comey gave broad discretion to U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald of Chicago when he was appointed to investigate the leak in December 2003. Margolis is not expected to alter Fitzgerald's mandate in what are likely to be the final months of his investigation. The grand jury ends its term in October.

(snip)

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/C/CIA_LEAK_PROBE?SITE=1010WINS&SECTION=POLITICS&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2005-08-12-19-43-44

[growlypants]

9. 1

[newyawker99]

17. Hi growlypants!!

Welcome to DU!! :toast:

[growlypants]

10. and shotguns too, but only those of the "sawed off" version.

Have to fit them under the seat or tuck them safely away in the overhead!

[Mnemosyne]

12. Don't forget the ice picks Bluebear, we all need

one of those inflight!!

[Bluebear]

13. That's right, if my bourbon and Coke comes with a big old cube

I have to hack it down into more manageable cubes!

[Mnemosyne]

19. Wouldn't want to choke on that big one!! lol n/t

:rofl:

[DoYouEverWonder]

15. Hey, I've flown with hammers and chisels

because I like to go fossil hunting whenever possible. However, even before 9-11 the airlines wouldn't let me take that stuff on the plane in my carry on luggage. It was mandatory to check it in. Before 9-11 I thought it was funny. My husband and I would joke about what did they think, that we were going to start trying to take the plane apart? Now it's not so funny anymore I suppose.

[Mnemosyne]

18. I'm still trying to wrap my head around

icepicks? What on earth would anyone be carrying one for? Boggles the mind!!

Fossil hunting, sounds great! Was major activity as a child/teen, that and arrowheads. Now showing grandson what to look for. The field next to the house was full of them, people came for miles around to look when field was plowed in the Spring. What's the oldest you've found?

[DoYouEverWonder]

20. Trilobites probably

from Delta, Utah. I think they're about 450 million years old. There's a quarry full of them down there.

Around where I live in No FL we've got lots of shark teeth in the creeks and we find lots of chert and sometimes arrowheads in the cow pasture next door to me.

Lot's of fun.

[Mnemosyne]

21. Trilobites, those things on Star Trek?

lol Just kidding! How cool! I never knew many of the names, need to start learning for the grandson. Are there books with pics for classification made easy?
Thanks.
V

[Bluebear]

8. Oh jeez they called Miles O'Brien out of his sleep to comment on CNN

This could go on for an hour, since he is such an aviation 'expert'.

[Bunny]

11. They just confirmed that there are no survivors.

Such a shame.

[Syncronaut Seven]

14. ABC news reporting pilots reported a malfunction with air conditioning sys

before losing contact. Sounds like asphyxiation of pilots followed 1 hour later by running out of fuel.

Were pilots locked in cockpit? Did new security procedures prevent intervention by attendants or passengers?

[LisaL]

16. Maybe passengers were asphyxiated as well?