Tuesday, March 27, 2012
A JetBlue flight from New York to Las Vegas made an emergency landing Tuesday morning after the flight’s captain ran through the cabin screaming “Iraq, al Qaida, terrorism, we’re all going down.”
The captain became incoherent during the flight, causing him to be ejected from the cockpit by the co-pilot. A passenger said that the pilot then appeared to have a panic attack, and started pounding on the cockpit door, according to a passenger tweeting that the pilot “went nuts.”
A flight attendant asked passengers through the flight intercom for help restraining the captain. He was tackled by 10 passengers, including a retired NYPD sergeant. The plane made an emergency landing in Amarillo, TX, where the deranged pilot was taken to a hospital.
SOURCE: Amarillo Globe News
From the Left 
Passengers will never allow another 9/11-type in-flight event to happen again. American travelers are now vigilant and ready to act. Even those of us with no law enforcement experience are ready to help the crew if asked.
Now passengers will need to pay extra to get chokehold lessons in the event your pilot or flight crew goes bezerk.
What the hell was wrong with the pilot? Jet Blue needs to implement better pilot screening before I would ever fly them. This is nutty.
The pilot should be prosecuted.
People are saying he was “in distress.” I ask, why doesn’t JetBlue perform mental health evaluations on their crew before they take 150 passengers 7 miles above the ground?
My favorite JetBlue scandal was when flight attendant Steven Slater had reached the end of his rope, cursed out a passenger, said over the PA system that he was “done,” grabbed two beers, and slide down the plane’s emergency slide. Investigators concluded he was drunk and dealing with mental issues. What is happening at JetBlue? The blue-painted planes look so clean and tidy. Obviously, there are problems at the company that push employees over the edge.
The feds are going after the pilot. His behavior interfered with the operation of a commercial flight and several flight attendants were injured in the process of subduing the 6’4″ pilot. Anyway you look at it, the pilot is in trouble and, JetBlue now has an established reputation as an airline out of control.
This is an unfortunate incident which can happen to any one from any airline whether it’s a captain, flight attendant, passenger agent or passenger. Let us not point fingers at others for something he/she cannot prevent. we all are human beings and anyone can flip at anytime given the circumstance. Even if a mental health evaluation is being carried out on a captain prior to takeoff or even weeks before, that does not say that at any given time this type of sickness can’t trigger. Remember, This is an illness that can occur at any time and not a planned event.