The man who stole the passenger plane acted alone; motive a
SEATTLE –
The FBI has completed its investigation of an event where a man stole a Horizon Air plane from Sea-Tac Airport and took it on a wild 75-minute flight before crashing on a small island in Pierce County, Washington.
>> Read more trending news
The investigation concluded that 28-year-old Richard Russell from Sumner, an employed Horizon crew on Sea-Tac, crashed the deliberate plane on Ketron Island August 10th. Russell was killed in the crash, and the Pierce County Medical Examiner's office found that death was suicide.
"I think I'll try to make a barrel, and if I'm fine, I'll go down and call it one night," Russell said from the cockpit, according to a recording of the conversation by air traffic.
"If the pilot had wanted to avoid impact on the ground, he had the time and energy to pull the column back, lift his nose and start a climb," the FBI report said.
The report also said that agents never found a clear motivation for theft.
The investigation found that Russell did not call the stolen plane that addressed a motive, and the cockpit voice recorder did not capture any sounds that had not already been sent to the radio.
KIRO TV talked with Russell's friend and former colleague Robert Reeves, who said Russell was a hard worker who loved aviation, but he admits that Russell was unhappy with his salary.
"He was very stressed about the financial situation he was in. He has worked longer in Horizon than I did, and he still did not do $ 15 an hour," Reeves said.
During the flight he told the airline he "did not really plan on landing" the plane, and he described himself as "just a broken guy." "
Although investigators received information about Russell's background, potential stressors and personal lives, it did not give any element a clear motivation for Russell's actions," said the report.
"Interviews with colleagues, friends and family – and review of text messages exchanged with Russell during the event – identified no information that would indicate theft of aircraft was related to wider criminal activity or terrorist ideology."
The FBI found Russell familiar with the checklist to start the flight and searched the web for flight instruction videos. Ents say they found no evidence that he had any pilot training, formal or casual, and that he acted alone.
"Comprehensive investigative activity failed to reveal any other issues involved in the planning or execution of unauthorized aircraft. "
