Tuesday, July 8, 2008

Continental airliner buzzed by enthusiast model rocket?

FBI officials have been called in to assist the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) in its investigation concerning a mid-air incident that recently took place between an outbound Boeing 737 jetliner and an enthusiast’s homemade rocket.

The near miss was revealed on Monday when a Continental Airlines pilot reported to shocked air-traffic controllers in Houston that a projectile with a flaming tail had hurtled past the plane’s cockpit shortly after takeoff from George Bush Intercontinental Airport.

“We don’t know for sure what the object was.

But we think it might be somebody doing model rocketing,” commented FAA spokesman Roland Herwig in a Houston Chronicle report. “The pilot saw the rocket and some people saw the rocket’s trail.”

While it has not yet been confirmed that the object was indeed a rocket, the FAA has said that model rockets have been known to pass into the airspace of passenger flights in the past.

The administration has also noted that the Memorial Day holiday would certainly have qualified as prime time for such a launch. - ttherald

First a nose cone is dented, now this...

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