Helicopter incident

[dcs13]

http://thehill.com/policy/transportation/239063-dhs-chief-gyrocopter-flew-under-the-radar

Well, no shit Sherlock. Why the fuck is our "radar" not any better than this ? Flew all the way from Gettysburg and straight up the memorial...Should have turned left and dropped in on the west lawn...
I would have expected anti aircraft batteries to have downed him way before he got to the Capitol.

[Forever_frost]

Tea Party Attack on White House, racist NRA member attempted assassination of president through VBIED

[likeitfast55]

Very small, I bet the cross section of a drone. Low and tree top, I bet he never showed up on radar. Does anyone know if the White House has a Phalanx Close-In Weapon System CIWS on property? (I know I read way too many Clancy novels)

[helosailor]

Gyrocopter =/= helicopter

[dcs13]

They should have had these deployed:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-3042633/The-jeep-drone-Navy-reveals-anti-UAV-weapon-fire-lasers-moving-vehicle.html

[Binky]

Very small, I bet the cross section of a drone. Low and tree top, I bet he never showed up on radar. Does anyone know if the White House has a Phalanx Close-In Weapon System CIWS on property? (I know I read way too many Clancy novels)

after searching for it, i'm sure i showed up on some government lists.

[svauto-erotic855]

Ground based radar is not really good for detecting stuff near the ground. Radar is line of sight and there is a ton of ground clutter. Radar mounted on a blimp looking down is the only way to reliable detect this type of threat and even then it would not be perfect. Go slow enough near a hwy and you will just appear to be an 18 wheeler to the radar operator.

There are very few anti aircraft batteries in the lower 48 because we have owned the skies for the past 70 years or so and assume that our fighters can match any threat that may come our way.

The Cubans flew a Mig up the Mississippi by going low and slow and it was not detected until it got to Memphis and was not intercepted until Kansas City.

[Mongoose]

Tea Party Attack on White House, racist NRA member attempted assassination of president through VBIED

No, he said he was protesting the lack of campaign finance reform, and how the common person is priced right out of the government`s influence. He`s going to do an indepth interview for ABC.

If anything, I`m willing to bet he`s some sort of leftist.

http://abcnews.go.com/US/gyrocopter-pilot-expected-stopped-capitol-lawn/story?id=30424211

The Florida mailman who flew a gyrocopter through restricted airspace and landed on the Capitol lawn last week said he expected to be stopped along the way.

Doug Hughes told reporters outside his home in Ruskin, Florida, early Sunday that his flight from Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, to Washington, D.C., went mostly as planned. He called landing on the Capitol lawn Wednesday as onlookers waved to him "surreal."

"It was amusing because people were not frightened at all. They looked at it and people waved to me," Hughes said. "People waved to me and I waved back. That part was surreal."

Hughes, 61, was arrested immediately after landing outside the Capitol. He was charged with operating an unregistered aircraft and violating national airspace and faces four years in prison, plus fines.

Hughes said that he didn't expect to make it to the Capitol lawn as part of his plan to draw attention to campaign finance reform.

"I had expected to be intercepted on the way," he said.

Despite being able to land on the lawn, Hughes said he doesn't believe Washington, D.C., has a security problem.

"The security around D.C. is iron clad," he said. “I seriously suspect that if you were to get into a gyro tomorrow, it wouldn't work.”

Though the Secret Service had learned of Hughes’ general plan more than a year earlier, federal authorities insisted they had no reason to know he would actually carry it out.

Hughes first came to the Secret Service’s attention in October 2013 after “a concerned citizen” told them “about an individual purporting their desire to land a single manned aircraft on the grounds of the United States Capitol or the White House,” the Secret Service said in a statement last week. Within days, Hughes was interviewed by the Secret Service, which then alerted the U.S. Capitol Police to his plans.

“A complete and thorough investigation was conducted,” the Secret Service said in its statement.

Hughes told the Tampa Bay Times on Friday that he needed to return to home before his house arrest began Monday. He'll wear an electronic monitoring ankle bracelet until a court hearing in Washington, D.C., next month.

“At no point did I feel that it was not a good idea," he told reporters Sunday. "We got bigger problems in this country than fussing."

When asked whether he considered himself a patriot, he replied, "No, I am a mailman."

ABC News' Mike Levine, Pierre Thomas, Jack Date, Jack Coherty contributed to this article.

[dcs13]

I wonder what the "rules of engagement" are for the Capitol Police and Secret Service on something like this . That thing was low and slow enough for small arms fire to bring it down easily.

[Mongoose]

I wonder what the "rules of engagement" are for the Capitol Police and Secret Service on something like this . That thing was low and slow enough for small arms fire to bring it down easily.

I think they handled this quite well. The incidents that happend when Slick Willie was President when the plane landed in DC, and the guy with the rifle that showed up and and began to fire at the White House should give you your answer as to what they will do when they find a threat to be substantial.

[Binky]

When asked whether he considered himself a patriot, he replied, "No, I am a mailman."

[IHaveAMustang]

Unusual amount of restraint. I figured:

[Gasser64]

Tea Party Attack on White House, racist NRA member attempted assassination of president through VBIED

Goebbels approved propaganda for everyone. He'd be proud of our media!

[bcoop]

Props to the guy for having such a firm belief he was willing to die for it.