Posted on 07/08/2006 7:03:24 AM PDT by devane617
TAMPA - Delta Flight 1850 wound toward Tampa International Airport on the final leg of its journey from New York, full of tired passengers.
Only one of them knew Neftali Laimendez, 24, a U.S. Army specialist who was days away from discharge. Now, few aboard can forget him.
A pastor, two businessmen and a father jumped from their seats to subdue Laimendez as he raced up the aisle and banged on the locked cockpit door, airport officials said.
They pinned Laimendez to the floor for about five minutes, until the plane landed.
"There was no way anybody was going to let him up," said the pastor, Herb Freitag, 64, of Chapel by the Sea community church in Clearwater.
No one could say Friday what triggered the outburst. Laimendez's brother, Robert Cordero-Mendez, 19, was on the flight and explained to passengers that Laimendez had recently served in Iraq, Freitag and the others said. Cordero-Mendez apologized for his brother's behavior.
Laimendez was being evaluated Friday under the Florida Mental Health, or Baker, Act. The FBI and U.S. attorney's office had not determined whether he would face criminal charges.
Airport Police Chief Paul Sireci said officials thought Laimendez might have post-traumatic stress disorder and had him examined.
Reached by phone at his Tampa apartment, Cordero-Mendez declined an interview but said: "He asked for help while he was in the Army. They didn't give it to him. Now this happened."
An Army spokesman at the Pentagon said Laimendez, whose name is listed as Lai on his Florida driver's license, was stationed at Fort Riley, Kan., with a field artillery unit. He had taken terminal leave - similar to paid vacation - on May 25. His tour of duty was to expire next Wednesday.
An airport police report said Cordero-Mendez had wanted to get his brother medical treatment in New York, but their mother, who lives in Tampa, wanted them to come here. The brothers took off from LaGuardia Airport sitting in Row 24 at 8:05 p.m.
The plane, which has about 150 seats, was scheduled to land at 11:03 p.m. About 15 minutes before landing, Jason Moore, a passenger in Row 36, saw Laimendez walk past him and sit in the last row.
Laimendez began poking a woman in front of him in the shoulder, and she signaled to a flight attendant that the man was bothering her, Moore said. Laimendez also pointed at a man across the aisle, gesturing at the tattoos on his own forearms, according to Moore.
"I'm looking back, nervous, thinking, 'Can't they land this plane any faster?'" said Moore, 27, a television research analyst traveling to visit relatives in St. Petersburg.
Laimendez did not speak to the flight crew or his brother, who approached and spoke to him in Spanish, Moore said. "All of a sudden he gets up and sprints like he was doing a hundred-yard dash toward the front of the plane."
The man's heavy footfalls sounded at first like a child running, said Adam Davisberg of Monroe, N.Y., seated in Row 14 with his 3-year-old daughter.
"When I saw him slamming the cockpit door, I thought he was trying to do something," such as hijack or crash the plane, said Davisberg, 38.
The running man also startled first-class passengers Gordon Montoya, a Brandon businessman, and Freitag. Freitag and his wife, Lorraine, had been bumped to first class and were seated in the first row after missing a connecting flight at LaGuardia.
"He hit that cockpit door, pounding on the door, trying to open it," Herb Freitag said.
Montoya said that without thinking, he rushed forward and grabbed the man's legs. "I tried to get him up off the ground so I could get him down," he said.
As the two wrestled, Freitag said, he grabbed at Laimendez as well. By this time, Montoya had pinned his legs, and Davisberg placed his foot on Laimendez's chest.
"It was kind of this ad hoc group that acted together, and I was encouraged by that," said James Abbott, 37, a Sarasota businessman who also joined the fracas.
Richard Stevens, the Tampa airport's deputy federal security director, praised the passengers for remaining calm and acting swiftly.
"We would never recommend that someone put themselves in harm's way, but the entire culture of how people react to these things since 9/11 has made people not likely to stand by," he said.
On Sept. 11, passengers on United Flight 93, the hijacked plane that went down in Pennsylvania, tried to thwart the terrorists.
As others called the Tampa plane passengers heroes, Abbott shrugged off the label.
"I think it's kind of a tragedy," he said. "I hope he gets whatever help he needs. He put himself in a dangerous situation."
Larium???
The guy is probably lucky he wasn't beaten to death by a bunch of terrified passengers.
He is very lucky the passengers did not beat him to death. The era of hijacking an American passenger plane is over.
Wonder is the Army knows his real name?
And that's a good thing.
When the possible alternative is to die and thousands more too? Stand by and do nothing?
I ran across a guy at a track-meet, in Texas, whose name was Shithead (pronounced 'sha-theed'). I've always wondered where his career would take him.
Why the hell is the Army seperating this guy with untreated mental health issues?
John Wayne said it best: “Courage is being scared to death but saddling up anyway”
These guys didn't know (if they even thought about it) if the perp had a grenade or bomb - not likely these days, but still......
It is the decades of telling people to give the bad guys what they want and dont resist that led to 9-11. The sooner this reactive mentality spreads to society in general the better. The response needs to be the same for any crime and not just on airplanes. Evil triumphs when good men do nothing!
Good question, but as usual we don't know the whole story. The media never does follow-ups on stories like this.
"He is very lucky the passengers did not beat him to death. The era of hijacking an American passenger plane is over."
The Friday after 9/11, we had a special service at our church. It was well attended by regular members, a lot of not so regular members and people we had never seen before.
There was coffee and soft drinks afterwards in the church meeting hall. The women and some of the new people went into the hall. About 20 of the guys gathered in the court yard and discussed what happened. All of us were vets from WWII to a couple of Desert Storm vets. In a very short time we came to one conclusion, that if we were passengers on an airplane, we would never allow the hijacking of that plane to happen. We would not sit there and watch it happen.
I know that we were not the only ones, who came to this conclusion.
Last but not least, many of the ticket agents and flight attendants make sure that guys who appear to be capable like these 3 guys on this flight, sit on aisle seats.
Many of our younger male relatives, who are bigger than average size and are very athletic in appearance, constantly get moved to aisle seats.
A friend, who is 6'5' and played college football and semi pro rugby gets upgraded to business section on a regular basis and gets an aisle seat. He jokes that they have a profile on him. About a month after 9/11, a senior flight attendant whispered to him, "Would you be willing to sit an aisle seat just incase we need you?" He said yes, and since then on that airline, which he flies most of the time, he gets an aisle seat or is upgraded for free to an aisle seat in Business or first class.
The dems may have forgotten what happened on 9/11, but Americans haven't.
He was in the LAST row and then came running towards the cockpit???Where were the stewardesses?? Aren't they usually in the front by the cockpit??
I think Gen. Patton had a different name for "post-traumatic stress disorder".
Reached by phone at his Tampa apartment, Cordero-Mendez declined an interview but said: "He asked for help while he was in the Army. They didn't give it to him. Now this happened."
Chalk up another one for the "victim culture". Blame everyone but yourself.
I predict that there will never be another in-flight hijacking of an American airliner. I know for a fact that I would never sit there and let some bearded nutjob fly my plane into a building. I don't care if the sonofabitch has a machete -- he's going down, hard.
I'm glad to see that others agree.
Discharging someone with mental problems seems like a good idea to me. It doesn't mean he wouldn't have been eligible for veterans health care.
But he doesn't sound like a guy I'd want running around in Iraq with a gun.
But he doesn't sound like a guy I'd want running around in Iraq with a gun.
Of course not, but they could have treated him a a stateside medical facility before releasing him from active duty. We don't have the whole story yet. This comes under "Taking care of your own" in my book.
The stewardesses were probably in the back, getting the drinks/snacks ready to serve, don't ya think?
They primarily are waitresses. They don't do much sitting around.
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