"Peachy Keen": Wild Air Traffic Control Broadcast With 'Pilot' Of Stolen Plane

-“You’ve got no issue with visibility or anything?

-“No, everything’s peach! Peachy keen! Just did a little circle around Rainier – it’s beautiful.”

Again, thankfully the reports coming in say no passengers were on board the Air Alaska flight apparently snagged by a mechanic. And now we’re hearing details on the Air Traffic Control conversation:

From Heavy.com‘s transcription of ATC, which you can actually listen to here:

At one point, he told the tower he was losing an engine. Periodically, his voice cut into the dispatches, sometimes sounding a bit frantic. At one point, “Rich” (or “Rick”), said on the aviation audio, “This is probably jail time for life, huh? I would hope it is for a guy like me.”

I know Coley covered this but a quick recap in 3 tweets & some background:

From KDKA Seattle:

“Reported stolen plane from Seattle’s #SeaTac airport has crashed near Chambers Bay Golf Course. Witnesses report F-15s chasing plane then saw smoke, and loud boom.”

That he was able to pull this off from a security standpoint, & that this was a man who was clearly not well and that it got to this point… I know the details aren’t in yet & it’s terrifying that it could have been so, so much worse for so many people.. but after listening to the audio I felt really sad for this guy. Wild all around.