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DC Cessna pilot disoriented; student saved them from being shot down
EFL. They came within seconds of being shot down - RTWTThe pilot who caused a midday panic in Washington on Wednesday failed to get briefings about the weather and restricted airspace and became lost minutes after leaving a Pennsylvania airport, Federal Aviation Administration records show. Hayden "Jim" Sheaffer, 69, froze when he saw a Black Hawk helicopter appear near his right wing while flying toward the White House and had difficulty operating his small, single-engine aircraft, officials said yesterday. It took the valiant effort of Sheaffer's student-pilot companion, Troy D. Martin, who had only 30 logged hours of flight time, to take over the controls and land the plane at an airport in Frederick, officials said. The FAA plans to take the most extreme action against a pilot since new airspace rules were put in place in 2003 and will revoke Sheaffer's pilot certificate, according to aviation officials who spoke on condition of anonymity because the order had not been finalized. The FAA does not plan to take similar action against Martin, 36, because he is a student pilot and does not have a pilot certificate, sources said. New details are emerging about what took place in the cockpit of the Cessna 150 during the noontime drama that led to the evacuation of more than 35,000 people from the U.S. Capitol, White House and Supreme Court. A log prepared by federal security officials shows how tensions escalated to the point where a fighter jet was "about to use missiles" to shoot the plane down. If Sheaffer plans to fly again, he will have to start over with flight school lessons. Those lessons cannot begin until a year after the revocation order. "Our investigation is ongoing," FAA spokesman Greg Martin said. "It's clearly a very serious incident that warrants careful and thorough review of all pertinent information." Sheaffer and Troy Martin have been unavailable to comment since federal authorities released them Wednesday. They were forced down about 90 minutes after they took off from an airport in Smoketown, Pa., near Lancaster, headed for an air show in Lumberton, N.C. Some neighbors said they were mystified about the whereabouts of the two men and their families. At the Sheaffer home in Warwick Township, Pa., no one answered the door or telephone. About 10 miles away, at Martin's residence in Akron, Pa., a note on the door asked reporters to go away. No one answered the door or phone there, either. A next-door neighbor, Cindy Hamill, said of the Martins: "This family's in crisis." The FAA is planning to cite Sheaffer for "careless or reckless manner so as to endanger the life or property of another," records obtained by The Washington Post show. Sheaffer can appeal the revocation with the National Transportation Safety Board. Within hours of the scare, authorities said that the pilots were lost and disoriented. But the account provided in FAA documents casts Martin in a different light. "It shows a tremendous presence of mind to be able to take the training he had and, under a very stressful situation, to bring that aircraft to Frederick," said Chris Dancy, spokesman for the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association, a group representing private pilots. Dancy said Martin was probably about halfway through his student training, as most student pilots take about 60 to 75 hours to earn their certificate. Posted by: rkb 2005-05-14 |
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