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OfflineshiZZaGrayfox
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Pilot Attempts to Kill 83 People After Taking Mushrooms
    #28516791 - 10/24/23 04:04 PM (3 months, 2 days ago)

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/-duty-alaska-airlines-pilot-accused-trying-shut-engines-wrestled-cockp-rcna121906

The off-duty pilot accused of trying to bring down an Alaska Airlines flight told investigators he had not slept for 40 hours and believed he was having a "nervous breakdown," and also admitted to the use of psychedelic mushrooms, according to a federal complaint filed Tuesday.

The FBI is investigating whether the off-duty pilot — Joseph Emerson, 44, of California — was under the influence when he tried to shut down the plane's engines while sitting in the cockpit of Sunday's flight from Everett, Washington, to San Francisco, officials told NBC News.

Emerson denied to investigators he had taken any medications before getting on the flight, but spoke about becoming depressed six months ago and said it was his first time taking mushrooms, the complaint said.

"I didn't feel OK," Emerson said, telling investigators that he was tired and dehydrated, according to the complaint. "It seemed like the pilots weren't paying attention to what was going on."

"I pulled both emergency shut off handles because I thought I was dreaming and I just wanna wake up," he added.

Emerson now faces one count of interfering with flight crew members and attendants, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Oregon said.

He is already being held in an Oregon jail on 167 charges, including 83 counts of attempted murder, and is awaiting an arraignment Tuesday afternoon.
Emerson had been sitting in a flight deck jump seat in the cockpit, which is permitted for pilots who may be commuting between airports.

The federal complaint alleges that Emerson was engaging in "casual conversation" with the other pilots, discussing the weather and his career with Alaska Airlines, when he attempted to grab two red engine shutoff handles. Emerson threw his headset across the cockpit and told the pilots "I am not OK" as he reached for the handles, the complaint said.

One of the pilots grabbed Emerson's wrists, while the other declared an in-flight emergency. Emerson had to be "wrestled with" for several seconds until he settled down, the pilots told investigators.

Emerson had allegedly tried to pull the engine fire suppression controls, which would have turned off the engines at cruising altitude. (Experts say the ability to quickly turn off an engine may be crucial in emergency situations, such as a fire.)

The off-duty pilot was then forced out of the cockpit, and the other pilots secured the cockpit door.

Flight attendants told investigators that after they were alerted to an issue up front, they went to bring Emerson to the back.

Emerson said, "You need to cuff me right now or it's going to be bad," according to the flight attendants.

Flex handcuffs were placed around Emerson's wrists. While seated at the back of the plane, he attempted to grab the handle of an emergency exit but was stopped by a flight attendant who placed her hands on top of his, the complaint said.

A flight attendant said Emerson made comments like "I messed everything up" and acknowledged that he put people's lives at risk.

Passengers on Flight 2059, operated by Alaska Airlines subsidiary Horizon Air, lauded the crew's quick actions and ability to stop Emerson.

"I made eye contact with him," passenger Aubrey Gavello said after Emerson was booted from the cockpit and walked to the back of the plane. "It was like one of those soul-chilling, dead in the eyes, just calm and just kind of like he was taking in everyone around him."

About 35 minutes after takeoff, a flight attendant "frantically" alerted passengers over the loudspeaker that "we have a situation" and that the pilots needed to land the plane, Gavello said.

No details were given, but Gavello said it sounded like a medical-related emergency.

Gavello said she saw the flight attendant and a man, who at the time no one knew was an off-duty pilot, walking from the cockpit to the back of the plane.

She said the man was in zip ties and the flight attendant was "trying to calm him down, saying that we were going to get him on the ground and everything was going to be OK."

The man remained seated in the back, Gavello said, and the flight attendant informed the cabin, "I just want to let everyone know they're safe" and assured the passengers that the plane was not having mechanical issues.

"Her second announcement calmed everyone down," Gavello said, "and then we landed."

The plane made an emergency stop in Portland, where police were waiting to board the aircraft and escort Emerson off.

Gavello's boyfriend, Alex Wood, who said he had slept through the ordeal and only woke up when they were landing, had no clue that it was an Alaska Airlines employee accused of putting lives in peril and only learned more details after seeing news reports Monday morning.

"It's very scary to know that that person was allowed in the cockpit, in the jump seat, where he was sitting," Wood said.

"I thought I was being dramatic because I got off the plane and my boyfriend and I weren't sitting together, and I was like shaking and he was asleep the whole time, so he didn't know," Gavello said. "And I was like, am I being so dramatic or was that really traumatizing?" 

Alaska Airlines said it was "grateful for the professional handling of the situation" by the flight crew. The FBI also said it was investigating with support from the Federal Aviation Administration.

Emerson was initially employed by Horizon Air in 2001, and has also worked for Alaska Airlines and Virgin America.

A review of his mental state will be part of the investigation, aviation analysts said.

Pilots over 40 must undergo a medical evaluation every six months and disclose whether they are having mental health issues or taking medications. But full mental health evaluations are not part of a pilot’s physical exams, according to the FAA. Emerson’s last physical was in September.

Emerson lives with his wife and young children in the Bay Area community of Pleasant Hill, where a neighbor said he was surprised by the allegations.

There are "no indications of anything wrong" with him, Ed Yee said.


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OfflineshiZZaGrayfox
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Re: Pilot Attempts to Kill 83 People After Taking Mushrooms [Re: shiZZaGrayfox]
    #28516798 - 10/24/23 04:09 PM (3 months, 2 days ago)

In his defense, he says it was his "first time taking mushrooms"


Edited by shiZZaGrayfox (10/24/23 04:10 PM)


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InvisibleNillion
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Re: Pilot Attempts to Kill 83 People After Taking Mushrooms [Re: shiZZaGrayfox] * 2
    #28516801 - 10/24/23 04:12 PM (3 months, 2 days ago)

Quote:

Emerson threw his headset across the cockpit and told the pilots "I am not OK" as he reached for the handles




Remind me to avoid tripping balls and operating machinery that numerous lives depend up. Still... I blame the guy not the fungi.

Set and setting matter.


Edited by Nillion (10/24/23 04:12 PM)


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OfflineshiZZaGrayfox
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Re: Pilot Attempts to Kill 83 People After Taking Mushrooms [Re: Nillion]
    #28516803 - 10/24/23 04:14 PM (3 months, 2 days ago)

Set and setting...I've heard that expression before.
So you're telling me don't drop for the first time ever while riding jump seat in the cockpit of a 747?


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InvisibleNillion
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Re: Pilot Attempts to Kill 83 People After Taking Mushrooms [Re: shiZZaGrayfox]
    #28516833 - 10/24/23 04:30 PM (3 months, 2 days ago)

Quote:

shiZZaGrayfox said:
Set and setting...I've heard that expression before.
So you're telling me don't drop for the first time ever while riding jump seat in the cockpit of a 747?




I hate that the first reply to come to mind was "not without a Gopro, at least"

What was going through guys mind?
Other than a several milligrams of 4-OH-DMT, I mean.

Who does that?


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OfflineNorthernerM
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Re: Pilot Attempts to Kill 83 People After Taking Mushrooms (moved) [Re: shiZZaGrayfox] * 1
    #28516882 - 10/24/23 05:10 PM (3 months, 2 days ago)

This thread was moved from The Psychedelic Experience.

Reason:
Goes here


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OfflinegeokillsA
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Re: Pilot Attempts to Kill 83 People After Taking Mushrooms (moved) [Re: shiZZaGrayfox] * 1
    #28516900 - 10/24/23 05:20 PM (3 months, 2 days ago)

This thread was moved from The Pub.

Reason:
Since this thread includes a news article, and we already have a alrady have pub thread on this subject, I'm moving this to news.


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InvisibleveggieM

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Re: Pilot Attempts to Kill 83 People After Taking Mushrooms (moved) [Re: geokills] * 3
    #28516962 - 10/24/23 06:07 PM (3 months, 2 days ago)

I'm not sure why it is, but pilots do seem to have a higher than average rate of mental illness, depression, drug and alcohol abuse.
Last month a British Airways pilot was fired for partying with cocaine before a flight. Pilots have been removed from flights for being drunk. The pilot in this story says he was depressed for six months and has taken mushrooms. And there have been cases of pilots crashing their planes to commit suicide while loaded with passengers.

Maybe these men and women should be tested for drug and alcohol use more often and be provided with frequent on the job counseling and therapy.


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Offlinestzacrack
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Re: Pilot Attempts to Kill 83 People After Taking Mushrooms (moved) [Re: veggie] * 1
    #28517021 - 10/24/23 07:06 PM (3 months, 2 days ago)

Acute
Quote:

veggie said:
I'm not sure why it is, but pilots do seem to have a higher than average rate of mental illness, depression, drug and alcohol abuse.
Last month a British Airways pilot was fired for partying with cocaine before a flight. Pilots have been removed from flights for being drunk. The pilot in this story says he was depressed for six months and has taken mushrooms. And there have been cases of pilots crashing their planes to commit suicide while loaded with passengers.

Maybe these men and women should be tested for drug and alcohol use more often and be provided with frequent on the job counseling and therapy.




Maybe a high perxentage of pilots have combat experience, contributing to mental illness among airline pilots?

Honest question, reminds me of "suicidal dentists"


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Offlinezimmey
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Re: Pilot Attempts to Kill 83 People After Taking Mushrooms (moved) [Re: stzacrack]
    #28517068 - 10/24/23 07:49 PM (3 months, 2 days ago)

"According to a probable cause statement filed in Multnomah County Circuit Court, Emerson told Port of Portland police following his arrest that he had been struggling with depression, that a friend had recently died and that he had taken psychedelic mushrooms about 48 hours before he attempted to cut the engines. He also said he had not slept in more than 40 hours, according to the document."

Ok, from another article. I'm going to say it probably wasn't the shrooms.


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Invisiblenooneman
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Re: Pilot Attempts to Kill 83 People After Taking Mushrooms (moved) [Re: shiZZaGrayfox] * 1
    #28517190 - 10/24/23 09:56 PM (3 months, 2 days ago)

Yeah, there is zero evidence that he was under the influence of mushrooms at the time. There is also no evidence that he even took mushrooms at all, but even if he did, it was days prior. He had none in his system at the time.

Sounds like a typical excuse to me. "It wasn't my fault, it was the drugs."


Edited by nooneman (10/24/23 09:57 PM)


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OfflineshiZZaGrayfox
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Re: Pilot Attempts to Kill 83 People After Taking Mushrooms (moved) [Re: nooneman]
    #28517315 - 10/25/23 02:11 AM (3 months, 1 day ago)

Yea the first article I read made it sound like he was on mushrooms WHEN he did it, but he's saying it was a few days earlier.

Aren't there quite a few cases like this, however, where somebody with crippling depression takes shrooms or LSD and it causes them to break all the way? That doesn't mean it's the mushrooms fault, but if you're already so depressed you're thinking about killing yourself and other people, it seems it can do people in fairly often.


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Offlinezimmey
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Re: Pilot Attempts to Kill 83 People After Taking Mushrooms (moved) [Re: shiZZaGrayfox] * 4
    #28517316 - 10/25/23 02:12 AM (3 months, 1 day ago)

40 hours no sleep in a bad head space can do that all by itself though.


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Invisiblecricket
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Re: Pilot Attempts to Kill 83 People After Taking Mushrooms (moved) [Re: zimmey] * 1
    #28517385 - 10/25/23 05:30 AM (3 months, 1 day ago)

40 hours no sleep.
He thought he was dreaming when it happened.
Sounds more like amphetamines then shrooms.


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OfflineAnglerfishM
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Re: Pilot Attempts to Kill 83 People After Taking Mushrooms (moved) [Re: veggie]
    #28517399 - 10/25/23 06:25 AM (3 months, 1 day ago)

Quote:

veggie said:
I'm not sure why it is, but pilots do seem to have a higher than average rate of mental illness, depression, drug and alcohol abuse.
Last month a British Airways pilot was fired for partying with cocaine before a flight. Pilots have been removed from flights for being drunk. The pilot in this story says he was depressed for six months and has taken mushrooms. And there have been cases of pilots crashing their planes to commit suicide while loaded with passengers.

Maybe these men and women should be tested for drug and alcohol use more often and be provided with frequent on the job counseling and therapy.




I don't think this is the case. It's probably just that they have a higher security clearance level
due to their responsibility, so it is easier to detect. But of course, whenever there's a case, we'll
hear about it. Think of all the fucked up insurance agents, car salesmen, librarians and fishmongers
we never get to hear about. Or even mycologists.


That being said, the 40 hours of no sleep seems to me to be the stronger factor inciting such behavior.
Whether that is due to illicit substances or not, I can't honestly tell. I do have a hard time to sleep
when coming down off of mushrooms, but it never lasts long. 

All I know is that whenever I have to stay awake for much more than 24 hours, my perspective of reality
narrows down gradually to covering the bare necessities, and it becomes almost painful even to just do
simple things like walking or saying 'yes' or 'no'.

But with this pilot's depression in mind, I remember a friend who got a severe case of insomnia and
depression after being dumped by his girlfriend.


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Offlineafrogus
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Re: Pilot Attempts to Kill 83 People After Taking Mushrooms (moved) [Re: Anglerfish] * 2
    #28517541 - 10/25/23 09:26 AM (3 months, 1 day ago)

Misleading title and sensational journalism. Definitely no anti psychedelic agenda here……


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InvisibleCitizen X
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Re: Pilot Attempts to Kill 83 People After Taking Mushrooms (moved) [Re: afrogus]
    #28517638 - 10/25/23 11:22 AM (3 months, 1 day ago)

I miss the old days when they just made you gay.. sigh


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OfflineVP123
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Re: Pilot Attempts to Kill 83 People After Taking Mushrooms (moved) [Re: shiZZaGrayfox] * 1
    #28517711 - 10/25/23 12:53 PM (3 months, 1 day ago)

He may as well say that the devil made him do it. :shrug:


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OfflineYokal
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Re: Pilot Attempts to Kill 83 People After Taking Mushrooms (moved) [Re: VP123]
    #28518001 - 10/25/23 05:50 PM (3 months, 1 day ago)

anybody that hasn't slept in 40 hours is a crazy person maybe the mushrooms arent' to blame?


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OfflineDERRAYLD
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Re: Pilot Attempts to Kill 83 People After Taking Mushrooms (moved) [Re: Yokal]
    #28518418 - 10/26/23 01:45 AM (3 months, 22 hours ago)

Other articles on this topic certainly don't mention mushrooms.
Stupid journalists are stupid.


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Invisibledurian_2008
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Re: Pilot Attempts to Kill 83 People After Taking Mushrooms (moved) [Re: shiZZaGrayfox]
    #28518632 - 10/26/23 08:09 AM (3 months, 15 hours ago)

Quote:

One of the pilots grabbed Emerson's wrists.




You had better be in the custody of their air marshal, or whomever already. idk who it is, before you make me think that I am going to rapidly decompress at 30,000 ft, chicken wing. 

There's harmlessly retarded, and then there's dangerous to me.

Shame on any sturdy and awake person who hasn't said this.


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Offlinesolarshroomster
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Re: Pilot Attempts to Kill 83 People After Taking Mushrooms (moved) [Re: durian_2008] * 1
    #28518775 - 10/26/23 10:53 AM (3 months, 12 hours ago)

Expect the usual circus chase by the media and regulators of "this means drugs are always bad". I hope this doesn't effect the decriminalization movement, which is bringing countless healing to people with mental health issues, as well as a mystical awakening.


--------------------
Chopin in Eternal Sonata: "I believe that I am somehow being tested. That I am on this journey to come to some realization. And in order to do so, I think I’m supposed to live my life to the fullest, even if it is in this muddled world of dream and reality."


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Invisibledurian_2008
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Re: Pilot Attempts to Kill 83 People After Taking Mushrooms (moved) [Re: shiZZaGrayfox]
    #28518824 - 10/26/23 11:38 AM (3 months, 12 hours ago)

I am going to attract moral relativists like a lightning rod, just by virtue signalling, but I am objectively better; I didn't do that thing. We know that his behaviors were unsafe.

This successful, embedded -- some would say, elite -- perp begs serious questions about the screening criteria of your professionals in your career sector.


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OfflineNorthernerM
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Re: Pilot Attempts to Kill 83 People After Taking Mushrooms (moved) [Re: durian_2008]
    #28519395 - 10/26/23 08:20 PM (3 months, 3 hours ago)

40 hours no sleep isn't really that big a deal either. He skipped a night's sleep, people do that all the time. It's not extraordinary in any way.


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Offlinesuperreggie
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Re: Pilot Attempts to Kill 83 People After Taking Mushrooms [Re: shiZZaGrayfox]
    #28519943 - 10/27/23 09:41 AM (2 months, 30 days ago)

It's a bummer when I go to Shroomery and see clickbait fear-baiting titles that feed fear of psychedelics.

The guy admitted that he had taken mushrooms before. Not during the flight. Ugh. Face-smack.


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OfflineYthanA
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Re: Pilot Attempts to Kill 83 People After Taking Mushrooms [Re: shiZZaGrayfox]
    #28538469 - 11/11/23 10:28 AM (2 months, 15 days ago)

‘Is This Hell?’ The Pilot Accused of Trying to Crash a Plane Tells His Story.
www.nytimes.com

In the minutes before he boarded an Alaska Airlines flight home last month, Joseph Emerson, a pilot for the airline, texted his wife. He was eager to be home with their two young children and longing to be next to her. “I just want to hold you,” he wrote.

The flight was full, and Mr. Emerson was off duty, so he settled into the cockpit jump seat, making small talk with the pilots as the plane climbed southward out of Everett, Wash.

The plane reached cruising altitude and crossed into Oregon on its way to San Francisco. But Mr. Emerson appeared to grow agitated, throwing off his headset, the other pilots told the authorities later. “I’m not OK,” he told them.

Mr. Emerson suddenly reached up and yanked the plane’s two fire-suppression handles — designed to cut the fuel supply and shut down both engines. The pilots snatched his wrists, wrestling his hands away in a frantic attempt to avert disaster. They radioed that the flight needed to make an emergency diversion to Portland.

In his first interview since the Oct. 22 incident, Mr. Emerson painted a terrifying picture of the hourlong flight, one where he was overcome with a growing conviction that he was only imagining the journey and needed to take drastic action to bring the dream to an end.

“I thought it would stop both engines, the plane would start to head towards a crash, and I would wake up,” he said, speaking in a cramped visitation room at the county jail in Portland, where he was being held without bail.

Upon landing, police officers took Mr. Emerson, 44, into custody, and Multnomah County prosecutors charged him with 83 counts of attempted murder — one for every passenger and crew member he was accused of trying to kill. Separately, federal prosecutors accused him of interfering with a flight crew.

Mr. Emerson’s account of what happened during the flight is corroborated in its key details by what flight attendants and pilots told the police, as well as text messages and his wife’s description of her conversations with her husband both before and after the flight. Prosecutors did not discuss the case beyond the charging documents.

Mr. Emerson, who has pleaded not guilty, said he had no intention of hurting anyone that day. Instead, he said, he was desperate to awaken from a hallucinogenic state that had consumed him since taking psychedelic mushrooms two days earlier, during a weekend getaway with friends to commemorate the death of his best friend. It was a loss that had plunged him into deep grief and triggered a search for help with what he realized were longstanding mental health issues.

For decades, the Federal Aviation Administration has grounded pilots dealing with depression or other mental diagnoses, with policies so strict that the decision to seek psychiatric help or a prescription for standard antidepressant medication is enough to trigger a suspension of their flight eligibility. It is a system that has left many pilots, including Mr. Emerson, to struggle largely alone.

“A lot of us aren’t as forthcoming as we otherwise would be,” Mr. Emerson said.

‘I can’t diagnose you’

As a child, Mr. Emerson had such a deep fascination with airplanes that his friend’s father helped organize an introductory flight for him in fifth grade. The instructor flew over Mr. Emerson’s house, and by the time they were back on the ground, the boy knew what his future would be.

Over the next few years, Mr. Emerson said, he saved up money for flying lessons, placing ads in the local newspaper in Cheney, Wash., to drum up lawn-mowing jobs. He began flight training just before he turned 15 and got his license at 17.

After college, Mr. Emerson began working as a commercial pilot, moving through jobs at Alaska’s partner carrier, Horizon Air, then Virgin America, which Alaska later acquired. He developed a reputation among colleagues as a calm, levelheaded presence in the cockpit. To passengers, he often had this message: “Be excellent to each other.”

His wife, Sarah Stretch, said he was the same way with their family. Every night he was home, he read to their two children, she said. He coached their younger son’s baseball team.

“He’s the most caring and gentle person,” she said.

He worried about being away so frequently, and by 2015, Mr. Emerson was tapped to begin working as an instructor, allowing him to stay closer to home.

But in 2018, his life was jolted by the sudden death of his closest friend, Scott Pinney, who had been best man at his wedding. He died while jogging during a work trip to Hawaii. Mr. Emerson helped bring his body home and has worn a necklace containing his friend’s ashes ever since.

Mr. Emerson had been through counseling in the past, he said, beginning in childhood to help deal with brutal teasing at school, and later as a way to better himself and his marriage. But Mr. Pinney’s death left him dealing with what his therapist said looked like depression.

“She’s the first one who said, ‘You know, I can’t diagnose you, but would you ever consider seeing a doctor who could diagnose you and possibly get on an antidepressant?’” Mr. Emerson said. He did some research and learned that taking any medication would most likely ground him from flying for a prolonged period of time.

For decades, the F.A.A. banned pilots with depression from flying and prohibited them from using prescription treatments, even common antidepressants, hoping to avoid suicide attempts or other mental breakdowns in the cockpit.

Pilots undergo regular medical assessments in which they must disclose to the F.A.A. a range of medical diagnoses, including depression or anxiety, and document the health professionals they have consulted.

Such a strict system led many pilots to avoid both consultation and treatment. Acknowledging the stigma created by those rules, the F.A.A. in 2010 moved to approve certain antidepressants for use by pilots with mild or moderate depression. Pilots who choose to go on the medication are nonetheless prohibited from flying for months during a monitoring period, and the process of winning approval to go back to active flying can take even longer. Even then, they may not win approval to fly.

The potential effect on careers, according to aviation doctors, industry lawyers and pilots, has prompted many aviators to either lie about the treatment they are receiving — risking a punishment of five years in prison and a $250,000 fine — or simply avoid treatment.

On Thursday, the F.A.A. said it was establishing a committee on pilot mental health to look at “breaking down the barriers that prevent pilots from reporting mental health issues to the agency.” It said it was already hiring more mental health professionals to decrease “return-to-fly” wait times and incorporating research that allows for less-frequent testing of pilots using antidepressants.

Mr. Emerson said he had previously decided not to seek out a doctor’s examination or possible medication, and instead pursued alternative help on his own. That included a treatment that attempted to relieve trauma by revisiting painful memories.

And while he did not consider himself an alcoholic, he said he often self-medicated by drinking — though not to the point that it jeopardized his ability to fly. Pilots are prohibited from consuming alcohol within eight hours of flying and occasionally face random testing.

Alaska Airlines said that Mr. Emerson completed his medical certifications throughout his career “and at no point were his certifications denied, suspended or revoked.” In an email on Thursday, the company said that “more can be done” to support pilot mental health.

‘Am I dead?’

Over the past year, work grew more demanding. Mr. Emerson was shifting from Airbus planes to Boeing aircraft, a big learning curve. He took on the role of safety representative for Alaska’s San Francisco-based crew, charged with increasing the reporting of safety problems. The Boeing training kept him away from home for much of the summer, just as he and his wife were navigating health issues one of their children was having.

Then in October, he and several friends gathered on a remote property in Washington’s scenic Methow Valley to honor Mr. Pinney’s life — a memorial getaway they had also done the year before.

During a Friday night of sipping on whiskeys and beers, someone had the idea of taking psychedelic mushrooms. Mr. Emerson had never tried them; he would often avoid even secondhand marijuana smoke in case it showed up in a drug test. He said his friends assured him they were safe, did not last a long time and would not show up on a drug test. He was not scheduled to fly again for six days.

Around a fire, he ate a bit of the mushrooms. Soon, the friends were sharing deep conversations about Mr. Pinney, and Mr. Emerson fixated on the crackling of the blaze.

But as the others started going to bed that night, Mr. Emerson said, he began to feel a deep unease, a sense that his friends were teasing him and maybe trying to hurt him.

“I felt fearful of them,” he said. At the same time, “I started to have this feeling that this wasn’t real.”

He said he began worrying about the safety of his wife and children, fretted over his estranged relationship with his brother, replayed shameful things that had happened over his lifetime, from childhood to days in adulthood when he drank too much.

“I thought of a lot of traumatic things in that time where I was like, ‘Am I dead? Is this hell?’” he said. “I’m reliving that trauma.”

He woke up the next morning desperate to return home. He spent the day with a nagging sense that he was locked in purgatory.

‘I am horrified’

For many people, the acute effects of a psychedelic trip last for several hours. But as a legal therapeutic market for mushrooms recently launched in Oregon, some researchers have cautioned that psychedelics may have prolonged effects for those vulnerable to a psychotic disorder.

Having had little or no sleep, Mr. Emerson departed the getaway with a friend on Sunday and made his way to the airport in Everett, still with the recurrent feeling that none of what was happening was real. The GPS directions in the car made no sense to him; the airline staff seemed to be using the wrong protocols for boarding the plane; in the cockpit, he felt like he should have known one of the two pilots, but he did not and was confounded as to how that could be.

As the plane took off, he said, he struggled to understand the pilots’ response to a report of mild turbulence ahead. Were these really pilots? Was he still dreaming? He texted the friend who had dropped him off at the airport, reporting that he was “having a panic attack.” The friend asked if he needed anything.

“Send love,” Mr. Emerson replied. “I need to be home.”

The friend’s reply came through a spoken text-to-audio message he heard through an earbud under his cockpit headset. “Do your breathing exercises,” the friend advised. It was a comment that made no sense to him. He threw off the headset and yelled at the pilots for help. When nothing happened, Mr. Emerson said, he panicked, convinced he was indeed imagining the whole thing. He needed to wake himself up.

He grabbed the engine shut-off handles, located just above the jump seat where he was sitting.

The pilots sprang into action, grabbing his wrists. They pushed the emergency handles back into place, acting before the engines were starved of fuel.

Temporarily jarred back to reality, Mr. Emerson recalls leaving the cockpit, closing the door, asking a flight attendant for help and walking to the back of the plane.

As he moved past the passengers, he said, he saw a mother and children looking at their tablets, and it reminded him of all the times he had traveled with his own family. Nobody seemed alarmed, he said. Did they not know what had happened in the cockpit? Or was he still dreaming?

The pilots turned toward Portland, looking for a place to make a swift landing, and called for the aid of law enforcement. “We’ve got the guy that tried to shut the engines down out of the cockpit,” a pilot told air traffic controllers.

At the back of the plane, Mr. Emerson asked a flight attendant to restrain him. “You need to cuff me right now, or it’s going to be bad,” he said, according to a police officer who interviewed the flight crew.

Crew members affixed a set of flex cuffs, connected in the front, that still allowed Mr. Emerson some movement. Soon, he picked up a pot of coffee, chugging from it directly until a flight attendant took it away.

Mr. Emerson said he still was able to reach his phone and send off a few texts. Screenshots show he messaged a group of friends: “I’m having a mental breakdown and tried to turn off both engines on my flight home.” He sent another to his wife: “I’ve made a big mistake.”

Flight attendants recalled his repeatedly asking whether things were real or whether he was in a nightmare. At one point, he reached out to open the emergency door, thinking that if he jumped out, he would certainly wake up. A flight attendant stopped him by grabbing his hand.

When the plane landed, a line of law enforcement officers moved in to take him into custody.

He still could not shake his sense of confusion. One officer reported in documents that Mr. Emerson asked if their conversation was real. When the officer replied that it was, Mr. Emerson told him: “If this is real, and all of that was real, then I have done something to me that is unfathomable.”

Held in a detention room at the airport, he recalls stripping naked, trying to jump out a window, urinating on himself and trying to make himself ejaculate — all in hopes of waking up.

At one point, he was given a chance to call a lawyer and instead phoned his wife. She said it was clear from the call that he was not himself. At times he was mumbling and asking, “Is this real?” Then, suddenly, he was singing Boyz II Men’s “It’s So Hard to Say Goodbye to Yesterday.”

“It was not the Joe that I know,” Ms. Stretch said.

Over the weekend before the flight, she had been shocked when he phoned her from the retreat and told her he had taken mushrooms. She was bewildered about the emotion in his calls; he kept saying how much he wanted to be home.

Ms. Stretch said she had talked to her husband in the past about seeking more support or medications for the things that troubled him. He would say he did not want to take anything more than allergy pills; he did not want to risk their livelihood.

“His pilot career was his life,” she said. “This kid, since he was 11 years old, wanted to be an airline pilot.”

At his court arraignment two days after his arrest, Mr. Emerson said, he was still struggling to determine whether the proceedings and his lawyers were real. It was not until Wednesday, five days after consuming the mushrooms, he said, that things started to become clearer.

“I am horrified that those actions put myself at risk and others at risk,” he said. “That crew got dealt a situation there’s no manual, checklist or procedure that’s been written for. And they did an exemplary job keeping me and the rest of the people on that plane safe.”

What happens next, he said, is out of his hands. He said he wants to be as transparent as possible about what happened.

He also understands that however it ends, life may never be the same as it was before he boarded that plane.

“I don’t know if I’ll ever fly an airplane again,” he said. “I really don’t. And I had a moment where that kind of became obvious. And I had to grieve that.”


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InvisibleveggieM

Registered: 07/25/04
Posts: 17,501
Re: Pilot Attempts to Kill 83 People After Taking Mushrooms [Re: Ythan]
    #28571036 - 12/06/23 06:44 AM (1 month, 21 days ago)

Update ...

Alaska Pilot Who Tried to Crash Jetliner Draws Lesser Charges
December 5, 2023 - WWWeek

The DA wanted 83 counts of attempted murder. A grand jury indicted for reckless endangerment.

A state grand jury yesterday indicted Capt. Joseph Emerson, the Alaska Airlines pilot who tried to bring down an aircraft two days after ingesting psilocybin mushrooms in October, on 83 counts of recklessly endangering another person and one count of endangering an aircraft.

The charges are less severe than those sought at the time of the incident, when Emerson was arrested and booked into the Multnomah County Detention Center on 83 counts of attempted murder, one for each person on the plane. He remains in custody and is scheduled to be arraigned Dec. 7.

Reckless endangerment is a class A misdemeanor under Oregon Law that carries a fine of up to $6,250 and potential jail time of one year. Attempted murder, meantime, can be punished by seven or more years in prison.

“Yesterday, a Multnomah County grand jury decided that Captain Joseph Emerson did not attempt to injure anyone, and therefore declined to charge him with the 83 counts of attempted murder originally sought by the state,” Emerson’s attorneys at Levi Merrithew Horst PC said in a statement. “The attempted murder charges were never appropriate in this case because Captain Emerson never intended to hurt another person or put anyone at risk—he just wanted to return home to his wife and children. Simply put: Captain Emerson thought he was in a dream; his actions were taken in a single-minded effort to wake up from that dream and return home to his family.”

Attorneys in the office of Multhomah County District Attorney Mike Schmidt had sought to charge Emerson with 83 counts of attempted murder, but the grand jury declined to indict him on those, stiffer charges.

“At the conclusion of the presentation of evidence, the grand jury declined to true bill the attempted murder charges and instead opted to indict on 83 counts of recklessly endangering another person and one count of endangering aircraft in the first degree,” Schmidt’s office said in an email. “No prosecutors are in the room when the grand jurors deliberate. From the outcome, one could infer that the jurors found that Emerson acted not with intent to murder, but that he recklessly endangered the lives of the people on that plane.”

Alaska flight 2059, operated by Horizon Air, was en route from Everett, Wash., to San Francisco when Emerson, riding in a jump seat in the cockpit, tried to shut down thrust in the plane by engaging an emergency system that squelches fire in the engines. The two pilots wrestled him into submission before he succeeded in “blowing the bottles,” as the procedure is known.

The aircraft made an emergency landing at Portland International Airport around 6 pm, where Emerson told police officers that he had taken psychedelic mushrooms about 48 hours before.

Emerson, 44, of Pleasant Hill, Calif., told officers that he believed he was having a nervous breakdown and had not slept in 40 hours. “I didn’t feel OK,” Emerson told Simmons. “It seemed like the pilots weren’t paying attention to what was going on. They didn’t...it didn’t seem right.”

Emerson said he pulled the engine fire handles—one for each engine that cuts off the flow of fuel—”because I thought I was dreaming and just wanna wake up.”

In addition to the state charges, Emerson faces a federal count of interfering with a flight crew and attendants.


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InvisibleveggieM

Registered: 07/25/04
Posts: 17,501
Re: Pilot Attempts to Kill 83 People After Taking Mushrooms [Re: veggie]
    #28573906 - 12/08/23 06:11 AM (1 month, 19 days ago)

Update ...

Off-duty Alaska Airlines pilot accused of trying to cut plane's engines is released from jail
December 7, 2023 - ABC10

Joseph Emerson posted a $50,000 bond to get out. He will need to stay away from drugs and not come within 30 feet of an operable aircraft as conditions of release.

KGW News Video:


PORTLAND, Ore. — An ex-Alaska Airlines pilot accused of trying to cut the engines of a passenger flight while off-duty and riding in an extra seat in the cockpit was released from jail pending trial on Thursday after an Oregon judge granted him conditional release.

Multnomah County Circuit Court Judge Thomas Ryan made the decision as Joseph Emerson pleaded not guilty to reduced charges of reckless endangerment; he previously faced attempted murder charges.

Emerson, of Pleasant Hill, California, has also pleaded not guilty to a federal charge of interfering with a flight crew, and the judge in that case also agreed that he could be released pending trial.

The release conditions agreed to by defense attorneys and prosecutors in the state case include that Emerson post a $50,000 bond, undergo mental health services, stay away from drugs and alcohol, submit to testing for intoxicants as requested by supervisory authority, not come within 30 feet (9 meters) of an operable aircraft, reside in his home county, and abide by all conditions of his federal pre-trial release.

Emerson’s wife, Sarah Stretch, said she was happy her husband was coming home. Speaking to reporters through tears after the arraignment, she also said she was glad that the case has raised awareness of the issue of pilot mental health.

"I'm saddened that this situation had to happen to my husband and to the people it affected. But I know that this has created a movement and momentum to help thousands of other pilots," she said.

Defense attorney Noah Horst said Emerson did not fully possess his mental faculties when he was on the Horizon Air flight and did not consciously choose to put people at risk.

"Is he criminally responsible? No. Does he need help? Yes," he told reporters. "Does Mr. Emerson deserve to be home today with his family and surrounded by his friends? Yes, he does."

After Wednesday's hearing in federal court, Stretch told KGW her husband is "happy to be able to come home."

Emerson was released from jail late Thursday afternoon. Stretch, who was waiting for him outside, ran to him and wrapped him in a hug.

The conditions of Emerson's federal custody release are similar to those of the state case: he can't board an operable airplane, is forbidden from possessing psychedelic mushrooms and must undergo a mental health evaluation.

Emerson is accused of trying to cut the engines of a Horizon Air flight from Everett, Washington, to San Francisco on Oct. 22 while riding in the cockpit as an off-duty pilot. He was subdued by the flight crew and the plane was diverted to Portland, Oregon, where it landed safely with more than 80 people on board.

"It's a hard situation for a lot of people — not just for Joe, but for the people who were on the airplane, the pilots, for the flight attendants," Stretch said Wednesday.

According to charging documents, Emerson told Port of Portland police following his arrest that he had been struggling with depression, that a friend had recently died and that he had taken psychedelic mushrooms about 48 hours before he attempted to cut the engines. He also said he had not slept in more than 40 hours, according to the document.

Emerson's defense argues that he didn't intent to hurt anyone. He'd been struggling with depression and took psychedelic mushrooms two days before the incident. They claim the off-duty pilot thought he was in a dream.

"He had this abnormal experience," said Ethan Levi, one of Emerson’s defense lawyers, on Wednesday. "Now he's perfectly normal, rational. He's happy. He's optimistic. It's all very good."

The indictment indicates the Multnomah County grand jury heard from 13 witnesses including the flight crew, Emerson and his wife. It’s highly unusual for a criminal defendant to testify before a grand jury.

The averted disaster renewed attention on cockpit safety and the mental fitness of those allowed in them.


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