Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
decision not to sit and do nothing while vicious and depraved sociopaths
take away your life and your future.
Do not make any moves right away. It is possible that there is an armed
air marshal on board who may be planning to take action, and you need
to stay out of the way if shooting starts. Armed security agents typically
wait to assess the nature of the opposition before they act. They will be
readying themselves to attack the hijackers as they try to ascertain how
many bad guys they will be facing. They will prepare themselves to go for
their weapon even as they wait for the terrorists to become distracted and
turn their attention away. When the agents move, it will be quickly and
decisively. Remember, if you are on board an aircraft during this type of
emergency and a security agent takes action, do not get out of your seat
and try to help once the shooting starts. The agent does not know who
you are and will likely view you as another target who must be engaged.
Hijackers may have an accomplice or “sleeper” sitting among the passen-
gers. Keep down and cover your head. If you are traveling with children,
get on top of them. If the time comes and you need to fight, you must
fight with a level of ferocity foreign to most civilized people. You will now
be in a fight for your life and the lives of your family. You need to get
angry and to utterly annihilate the inhuman monsters who would take
your future from you. They care not at all if your spouse loses you or if
your children grow up without dad or mom around. This is not being
melodramatic. Todd Beamer knew this when he led an unarmed and
untrained group of passengers into hand-to-hand combat with the ter-
rorists. Could they have been successful in retaking the plane? It seems
that they were close to doing just that. The point is that they did not
accept their fate quietly. It is certain that their actions saved lives on the
ground. The passengers of Flight 93 denied the terrorists their goal. Per-
haps they saved the White House or Capitol building from destruction.
Who knows what effect that could have had on our government's ability
to respond? They did better than anyone could have hoped they would.
Would that they had been able to kill the terrorists and survive themselves.
CONFRONTING THE THREAT
The recommendations put out by the State Department have not been
changed as of this writing. The advice is still for passengers to do noth-
ing and not fight back. Travelers are advised not to get involved if they
