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Every day is day of some great culture war battle, or anniversary of some great past battle.
And this day is no different.
This day is Tyrone Day. The Road King Day.
Tyrone always wanted to drive big car, but he couldn't, because he was born as poor Black man. This made Tyrone very very sad.
One day, when Tyrone was, as always, walking on foot while watching rich whites in luxury cars whizzing around, he had enough. Tyrone pulled his gun, carjacked Lamborghini from some white swine and went on joy ride.
The grand joy ride, the greatest ride in Tyrone's life. Tyrone revved up the car to the max, the pigs had no chance to catch him. Until Tyrone crashed the car and killed himself.
Everyone remembers Tyrone, everyone sees him as heroic freedom fighter against racism and oppression.
When every Black man becomes hero like Tyrone, the white pigs will pay for all their crimes and Black people will be finally free.
Yes. this uplifting story really happened. Even in the case it hadn't happened exactly as described here, it is real and will continue to inspire all of us.
Rest in power, Tyrone.
It takes temendous skill and knowledge to even get a plane off the ground. Most people have the monetary means to at least become a recreational pilot but not the the commitment to learn. Meanwhile anyone with a screwdriver can steal a car. Tyrone joyrides happen every day and usually end in lots of collateral damage.
Doing a barrel roll with a passenger plane has likely never been done before, and likely never will ever again. Like it or not, this is a moment that all aviation enthusiasts around the world will take notice of. Meanwhile tyrome has done nothing that hasn't already been done by yesterday's tyrone.
If tyrome steals a car and sets a world record lap time or something, I think we'd all be impressed.
No it doesn't. Flying a plane is Nintendo-hard; the hard part isn't the actual flying but all the stuff built around it to make it more difficult to keep the number of pilots down. Learning arcane radio and airspace procedures, memorizing a few thousand checklists, reading 1950s telex-style aviation weather reports, etc. And dealing with the risk that if you get any of those arcane radio and airspace procedures wrong, you end up getting a number to call which connects you to an angry FAA guy who demands to know why he should let you keep your license, and there's only one attitude which works. And instructors, of course, who won't teach students who don't seem like they can display that attitude. Actually taking off... not that hard. I've heard twin-engine is actually harder... but I've heard it from the same people who swear flying a single-engine is hard when I know damn well a 9 year old tall enough to reach the controls can do it.
A fair number of old pilots did stuff like that when they knew their license was toast anyway. There's also FedEx 705, where the first officer inverted a DC-10 to foil a hijacking. As others mentioned, test pilot Tex Johnson rolled a prototype 707, twice.
ETA: Incidentally, Richard Russell himself never attended flight school and claimed he learned to fly from video games.
It's not that flying is particularly difficult or dangerous but rather that as the old quote goes "to an even greater degree than the sea, it is unforgiving of any carelessness, incapacity or neglect."
A barrel roll is a simple 1g maneuver if executed correctly but that "if" is load-bearing.
As much as modern aircraft may effecively fly themselves it is still in the interests of everyone both in the air and on the ground that those who are less diligent be kept out of the cockpit. You may not like it, but there is a clear rationale to the FAA's rules.
Even that isn't credible. The pilot can die and an airplane can fly for hours before it crashes. The existence of Aeroflot and various third-world airlines demonstrates while you can certainly get yourself killed in the air, it's not nearly so unforgiving as that statement would indicate.
Yes, to keep the sky an exclusive club. And to reduce the number of people the FAA has to ride herd on, and the amount of air traffic.
Conversly you can accidentally kill yourself and 66 others by entering an incorrect barometer setting.
And a single wrong turn (off a cliff) can lead to the death of an entire busload, too. That doesn't make driving a bus particularly unforgiving.
I'm pretty sure that if you took a random sample of 20 car accidents and comprared it to a random sample of 20 aviation accidents the fatality rate of the latter would would be substantially higher than the former regardless of whether former are more common.
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The FAA is a good example of regulatory capture. How is it that, in the land where healthcare is private, ATC is socialized and easily shut downs when the government does? They literally only have one ATC training academy in Oklahoma, there are no other options if you want to be an ATC. Predictably, this regulatory gatekeeping contributes to a shortage of ATC and pilots.
ATC and pilots are two different things. ATC was definitely held back by DEI considerations. Pilots are mostly not government employees. But the FAA's mandate is to keep the flying buses -- airliners -- safe. And they do, and part of that is discouraging use of the sky by anyone else. This suits commercial pilots fine; they hold private pilots in disdain. And it mostly suits private pilots who are "in the club" fine.
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