One more for now and then back to work for a while...
Commander Ted Muga, U.S. Navy (ret) – Retired Naval aviator (Grumman E-1 and E-2). Retired Pan-Am commercial airline pilot (Boeing 707 and 727).
* Interview Alex Jones Show 4/11/07: Alex Jones: Recap Hani Hanjour's maneuver, what they claim -- go through the maneuver they claim he did and then what supposedly happened there at the Pentagon ...
Commander Muga: The maneuver at the Pentagon was just a tight spiral coming down out of 7,000 feet. And a commercial aircraft, while they can in fact structurally somewhat handle that maneuver, they are very, very, very difficult. And it would take considerable training. In other words, commercial aircraft are designed for a particular purpose and that is for comfort and for passengers and it's not for military maneuvers. And while they are structurally capable of doing them, it takes some very, very talented pilots to do that. ...
When a commercial airplane gets that high, it get very, very close to getting into what you refer to as a speed high-speed stall. And a high-speed stall can be very, very violent on a commercial-type aircraft and you never want to get into that situation. I just can't imagine an amateur even being able to come close to performing a maneuver of that nature.
And as far as hijacking the airplanes, once again getting back to the nature of pilots and airplanes, there is no way that a pilot would give up an airplane to hijackers. ...
I mean, hell, a guy doesn't give up a TV remote control much less a complicated 757. And so to think that pilots would allow a plane to be taken over by a couple of 5 foot 7, 150 pound guys with a one-inch blade boxcutter is ridiculous.
And also in all four planes, if you remember, none of the planes ever switched on their transponder to the hijack code. There's a very, very simple code that you put in if you suspect that your plane is being hijacked. It takes literally just a split-second for you to put your hand down on the center console and flip it over. And not one of the four planes ever transponded a hijack code, which is most, most unusual. ...
Commercial airplanes are very, very complex pieces of machines. And they're designed for two pilots up there, not just two amateur pilots, but two qualified commercial pilots up there. And to think that you're going to get an amateur up into the cockpit and fly, much less navigate, it to a designated target, the probability is so low, that it's bordering on impossible."