Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2024/05/10/john-mulaney-learns-about-the-no-fly-zone-over-disneyland-but-dont-tell-fleeing-felons.html
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So, Repugnacans want to endanger thousands of people because a corporation exercised it’s first amendment rights. (Before you fly off the handle keep in mind that according to the Supreme Court corporations are legally persons.)
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Is that what they’re telling people?
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Section 91.137(a)(2). Restrictions issued in accordance with this section prohibit all aircraft from operating in the designated area unless at least one of the following conditions is met:
The aircraft is participating in hazard relief activities and is being operated under the direction of the official in charge of on-scene emergency response activities.
The aircraft is carrying law enforcement officials.
The aircraft is operating under an ATC approved IFR flight plan.
The operation is conducted directly to or from an airport within the area, or is necessitated by the impracticability of VFR flight above or around the area due to weather or terrain. Notification must be given to the ATC facility or office that was specified in the NOTAM for coordination with the official in charge of on-scene emergency response activities. Also, the operation does not hamper or endanger relief activities and is not conducted for observing the disaster.
The aircraft is carrying properly accredited news representatives, and prior to entering the area, a flight plan is filed.
So, aside from the…interesting…theory concerning how the obtained one; it would appear that condition 3 would make using a TFR area to hide from cop helicopters dubiously useful; no?
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Umm…yeah…don’t do this. He could very well end up charged as an accessory after the fact by doing this. I suspect so far, it hasn’t been helpful one single time to a specific suspect as he was live tweeting, but if a suspect ever actually does happen to be following the account as they are fleeing, and he gives them advice, and the police or prosecutor find out…he’s gonna be in trouble.
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There’s a pretty cool YouTube video of seen taken by a helicopter pilot while flying directly over the parks. It can be done, though there are of course restrictions. You have to notify Air Traffic Control, of course, and you can’t dawdle or hover while in the restricted area.
Also, I’m sure that police helicopters are exempt from the no fly zone, and Disneyland probably has more officers from Anaheim PD wandering around per square mile than any other place in the city.
Only an idiot would try this trick (though of course anyone that thinks they can win a police helicopter chase pretty much fits that description.)
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Two things can be simultaneously true:
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This temporary flight restriction never actually made any sense as a security measure. It requires that aircraft not fly within a 3 nautical mile radius of Disneyland, but aircraft accidentally violate that all the time, and the FAA doesn’t care enough to take any action against them. This isn’t the White House, so if any terrorists decided to fly a plane into the castle there’s no antiaircraft defenses or even enough time to sound a warning between the time they entered the 3 mile perimeter and the impact. So what possible purpose does the restriction serve?
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GOP politicians like Rep Nehls and Gov. DeSantis are assholes whose only concern is finding ways to publicly punish companies like Disney for failing to support their crusade against gay and trans folks. They don’t give a damn about whether or not this is an appropriate security measure or not. And it would be nuts to have legislators micromanage the Department of Transportation on these kinds of specific decisions.
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Lies!!!
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“Scramble fighters! Go go go!”
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Ok, I guess there is one…
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Hondo and Chewie can handle it.
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As an air traffic controller who works the airspace, let me clarify a few things:
- The 9/11 “security” reasoning for the TFR was just a smokescreen. Disney had wanted to restrict flights over the park for many years - they just couldn’t justify it. The only reason for the TFR is that they don’t want noise from aircraft detracting from the guest experience.
- There are so many exceptions, that the TFR is virtually useless. Any aircraft flying in- or out- of LGB, FUL, SLI, SNA is automatically allowed to fly through under the terms of the TFR.
- As an ATC, I have zero interest in monitoring the TFR. Any untracked target going though could be flying into FUL or LGB without talking to SCT, so why would I even look at it? Second, even if I thought an aircraft shouldn’t be there, the procedure is to start a track on the target, hand the track off to every subsequent controller (assuming we don’t lose radar contact due to low altitude, etc), MAYBE track it to it’s final destination (which could be hundreds of miles away), then have someone call the airport and ask the airport operator to walk out on the ramp and find the pilot, and finally have them give him a phone number to call so someone can tell him not to do that. There is ZERO real-time response to violators and virtually zero response after-the-fact.
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