Could have been a close call.
May 29, 2003 2:32 AM   Subscribe

2 stabbed in an attempted Qantas hijacking over Melbourne. I hope this isn't the start of a worrying new trend.
posted by Jubey (18 comments total)
 


Great, now they will be cracking down on wooden stakes at the security checkpoints. i guess my days of hunting vampires abroad are over.

Glad to hear that he didn't kill anyone. i would assume that 'stable condition' means that they are going to be ok.
posted by quin at 3:13 AM on May 29, 2003


yes it is the start of a worrying trend, it's time for everyones summer holidays so the newspapers start putting more focus on plane crashes, seeing as we've got past sars and iraq, there has to be something new to worry about.
posted by sgt.serenity at 3:16 AM on May 29, 2003


You can bypass all of those holiday hijack worries by staying home and getting drunk on the money you saved by not going on holiday. Works for me.
posted by squealy at 3:31 AM on May 29, 2003


"IDIOTS! They were chopsticks, for christ's sakes!" I yelled at BBC World not an hour ago (which is, incidentally, where I get most of my news minutiae) as they droned on and on about whether or not this constituted some kind of terror! attack!

I shouldn't get so annoyed at the evening news, I am aware (nor, equally, should I be so anally retentive as to criticize anyone for their choice of front page posts).
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken at 3:43 AM on May 29, 2003


An important issue is not being covered by any of the stories I've seen thus far: was this guy swarthy or not?
posted by PinkStainlessTail at 4:10 AM on May 29, 2003


A worrying new trend of simply posting news headlines to MeFi ? No, that's not new.
posted by Space Coyote at 4:39 AM on May 29, 2003


Great, now they will be cracking down on wooden stakes at the security checkpoints. i guess my days of hunting vampires abroad are over.

If they forbid wooden stakes, it means the vampires have already won.
posted by Slithy_Tove at 5:42 AM on May 29, 2003


the infidel koalas must be wiped off the face of the earth.
posted by sgt.serenity at 5:59 AM on May 29, 2003


If they forbid wooden stakes, it means the vampires have already won.

Only on the night flights...
posted by twine42 at 6:10 AM on May 29, 2003


It's all Sarah Michelle Gellar's fault for quitting Buffy.
posted by divrsional at 6:21 AM on May 29, 2003


An important issue is not being covered by any of the stories I've seen thus far:

What's Rain Man gonna think about all this?
posted by soyjoy at 7:20 AM on May 29, 2003


I shouldn't get so annoyed at the evening news, I am aware

no, really, stav, you SHOULD be annoyed. heinously annoyed. but you're not, not nearly annoyed enough to, for example, walk up to the writer on the sidewalk and punch him in the face while castigating him loudly as a liar and a failure to serve the people he supposedly informs. no, if reporters and editors were punched out 14 times on the way to the local brew pub everytime they pulled some shitty little bit of sleight-o-hand like this, one of two things would happen:

1) newspapers would stop lying
2) attacking journalists would be made a terrorist offense and most of the population would disappear into pens at gitmo.

oh. um, never mind.
posted by quonsar at 7:56 AM on May 29, 2003


There's no justice like Quonsar justice
posted by Space Coyote at 9:02 AM on May 29, 2003


Yes there is. Anyone who "learn[s] the meaning of American Justice" will tell you, it's pretty much the same thing (only without the sense of humor).
posted by soyjoy at 9:32 AM on May 29, 2003


I have been so irritated for these last 18 months because the thoughtless response to 9-11 has been to screen airline passengers more and more invasively, to the detriment of airlines and passengers alike. This story illuminates the already glowing reality that if someone wants to terrorize a plane crew, he can do it with his bare hands. So, secure the cockpit like its Fort Knox and scale back those shoe searches and keychain inspections. Focus on what can be prevented.
posted by squirrel at 10:19 AM on May 29, 2003


The return of a trend maybe?

"In quantitative terms, airline hijacking peaked in the period 1968-72 with 326 attempts around the world." cite
posted by smackfu at 10:42 AM on May 29, 2003


By the way, the AHA discourages "stable" as a descriptor of someone's medical condition:

"this term should not be used in combination with other conditions, which by definition often indicate a patient is unstable." (As one hospital spokesman put it, "You can be dead and
be stable.")


More info here.

(My mom does hospital PR...I learned this one at the dinner table when I was young.)
posted by Vidiot at 9:30 PM on June 1, 2003


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