A JetBlue Airways Corp. captain locked out of the cockpit by his co-pilot after acting erratically on a flight is a "consummate professional" with no history of trouble, Chief Executive Officer Dave Barger said.
Clayton Osbon has flown for JetBlue for 12 years, a spokeswoman, Jenny Dervin, said today. Dervin said Osbon has been charged with "interfering with crew-member instructions" and remains in a medical facility in Amarillo, Texas, where the plane landed, in Federal Bureau of Investigation custody.
Flight 191 was en route yesterday to Las Vegas from New York when the pilot began behaving erratically, the Federal Aviation Administration said. The co-pilot locked out Osbon after he briefly left the flight deck, and passengers wrestled the captain to the floor after he started shouting and banging on the cockpit door.
"I've known the captain personally for a long period of time and there's been no indication of this in the past," Barger said on NBC's "Today" show. JetBlue isn't aware of any similar incidents in the pilot's past, he said.
The New York-based airline isn't releasing further personal details on Osbon or on the co-pilot who diverted the plane to Amarillo, assisted by an off-duty pilot who was onboard, Dervin said. A call today to the FBI office in Dallas investigating the case wasn't immediately returned.
Barger told NBC that JetBlue will review its pilot screening process, adding that he is "very confident in our procedures and the industry's procedures."
Medical Checks
FAA rules require that airline pilots receive a medical check once a year if under 40 and every six months if older, according to the agency's website. The exam includes questions about mental health, according to the agency.
Flight 191, with 135 passengers and five crew members, was about halfway into the journey of about 2,250 miles (3,620 kilometers) when the incident occurred. The twin-engine Airbus SAS A320 was cruising at about 34,000 feet, based on data compiled by FlightAware.com, a real-time flight tracking site.
As the co-pilot declared a medical emergency and diverted to Amarillo, the plane descended more than 28,100 feet in about 13 minutes, more than twice as fast as the approach that would have been used to Las Vegas, the data show.
Flight Recording
"We're going to need authorities and medical assist to meet us at the airplane," Flight 191 told Amarillo air traffic control in a recording posted on the website LiveATC.net. The pilot later was assured that medical and security personnel were standing by ready to board the plane as soon as it landed.
Passengers subdued the captain in the cabin, the FAA said yesterday in a statement. Law enforcement officials "secured the pilot without incident" after landing, the FAA said.
The plane landed in Amarillo at about 10:11 a.m. local time. It left New York's John F. Kennedy International Airport at 7:28 a.m., more than half an hour after its scheduled departure.
In an unrelated incident yesterday, the crew on a US Airways Group Inc. flight between Charlotte, North Carolina, and Fort Myers, Florida, had to restrain a passenger who caused a disturbance "to protect the safety" of the flight, said Michelle Mohr, a spokesman for the carrier.
An off-duty law enforcement officer on Flight 1697 assisted attendants, she said. Police met the flight when it landed in Fort Myers and detained the passenger.
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