Wednesday, February 19, 2014

"It's a question of budget and staffing."

"No Swiss fighter jets were scrambled Monday when an Ethiopian Airlines co-pilot hijacked his own plane and forced it to land in Geneva, because it happened outside business hours, the Swiss airforce said."
When the co-pilot on flight ET-702 from Addis Ababa to Rome locked himself in the cockpit while the pilot went to the bathroom and announced a hijacking, Italian and French fighter jets were scrambled to escort the plane through their respective airspaces.
But although the co-pilot-turned-hijacker quickly announced he wanted to land the plane in Switzerland, where he later said he aimed to seek asylum, Switzerland's fleet of F-18s and F-5 Tigers remained on the ground, Swiss airforce spokesman Laurent Savary told AFP.
This, he explained, was because the Swiss airforce is only available during office hours. These are reported to be from 8am until noon, then 1:30 to 5pm.
"Switzerland cannot intervene because its airbases are closed at night and on the weekend,"
Is that why Hillary and Obama didn't do anything during the Benghazi Embassy attack? It happened during their off hours.

16 comments:

rcocean said...

Its too bad the USA decided to become British Empire Mark II, instead of another Switzerland. But I guess the Swiss have no desire to save the World for Democracy.

Leland said...

I suspect that information may come in handy sometime in the future.

Synova said...

What were they going to do? Shoot it down?

Even airliner-as-weapon doesn't make that automatic and presumably the first thing he did was say who he was and what he wanted... to land safely in Switzerland...

Revenant said...

Switzerland only maintains a military at all so that if it needs one in the future it won't have to train one up from scratch.

The country faces no military threats, so maintaining constant 24/7 vigilance would be silly from a cost/benefit perspective.

Methadras said...

Switzerland looks better and better.

Shouting Thomas said...

I have nothing against the U.S. military maintaining office hours only.

Would keep a whole lot of people out of mischief.

We spend untold millions, and it didn't seem to do much good on 9/11. Jet fighters up our asses, but still helpless.

edutcher said...

As they say, Switzerland IS an army.

rcocean said...

Its too bad the USA decided to become British Empire Mark II, instead of another Switzerland.

George Marshall wanted the Swiss model after his experiences in WWII.

ricpic said...

There's an Ethiopian in the woodpile!

Well, somebody had to say it.

deborah said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
XRay said...

8:43.

The level at which we could/should be comfortable here, in my opinion. just folks, talking.

XRay said...

Negate my 9:25, 8:43, that's okay. Though I will hold to my 9:25, even if it makes no sense without context.

deborah said...

~bonks XRay on the head~

XRay said...

Hahaha...

Accepted.

chickelit said...

1. Hold arms out in front of oneself as if driving a car.

2. Feign a slight. momentary turn to the left and back again with your hands -- only a few degrees or so.

This the effect said to be had on US and coalition fighter pilots during the First Gulf War when Switzerland forbade flyover rights en route to the Gulf.

deborah said...

Hee.

I'm Full of Soup said...

I wish O'Reilly had had the balls to ask Obama where he was that night since we still don't know what he was doing.