Wild Melee On Sacramento Flight; Flighter Jets Scrambled

April 22, 2006

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With three Secret Service agents aboard and the pilots fully in control of a United Airlines jetliner being diverted to Denver, two F-16 fighter jets scrambled to intercept the flight merely escorted the plane into Denver International Airport.

But the apparatus that could ultimately have lead to the plane with 138 passengers and six crew members being shot down — put in place after 911 — was fully operational Friday, with agencies that included the Federal Aviation Administration and the Department of Homeland Security on an open phone line monitoring the flight.

Had the plane “been judged as a threat by the highest levels of our government, they could make the decision to have the plane shot down,” said Lt. Commander Sean Kelly, a spokesman for NORAD, a U.S.-Canadian military command based outside Colorado Springs that monitors missiles, aircraft and space objects and warns of threats.

President Bush would ultimately make the decision.

Authorities said Jose Manuel Pelayo-Ortega — whose age and hometown were not immediately released — tried to open an door on the Airbus A-320 en route from Chicago to Sacramento, Calif., and then claimed to have a bomb forcing the emergency landing in Denver.

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