Why Alleged Airline Mechanic Sabotage Reminds Us Of Second Amendment Importance

Guns aren’t allowed on planes, for the most part. There are ways to fly with a gun, but they’re kind of a pain in the butt, enough so that it’s often just easier to drive instead of flying.

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As such, it’s easy to see some reports of potential terrorism regarding planes and not think about guns. You know, reports like this one:

The man arrested for sabotaging the navigation system on an American Airlines plane that was scheduled to take off from Florida earlier this year had ISIS propaganda videos on his cellphone. According to prosecutors, Abdul-Majeed Marouf Ahmed Alani has ties to the Islamic terrorist group through his brother in Iraq. The new revelations came during a bail hearing in Miami Wednesday. Alani is a naturalized citizen from Iraq.

From the Associated Press:

A federal judge cited new evidence of potential terrorism sympathies in denying bail for a mechanic charged with sabotaging an American Airlines jetliner.

U.S. Magistrate Judge Chris McAliley imposed pretrial detention for 60-year-old Abdul-Majeed Marouf Ahmed Alani at Wednesday’s hearing.

The new evidence presented by prosecutors includes that Alani has a brother in Iraq who may be involved with the Islamic State extremist group as well as statements Alani made about wishing harm on non-Muslims.

Alani is a naturalized U.S. citizen from Iraq. He’s not charged with a terror-related crime.

Alani is charged with sabotaging a Boeing 737 with 150 people aboard at Miami International Airport because ongoing labor negotiations were jeopardizing his chances at earning overtime.

Alani claimed he sabotaged the plane in order to get mechanic overtime pay. Luckily the issue was noticed by pilots before taking off and nobody was hurt. Alani was caught on surveillance video and he conducted the sabotage for seven minutes.

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Now, it’s possible that Alani was legitimately trying to scam a little overtime, but I’m skeptical. I can’t help but believe there are plenty of ways to sabotage a jet where it won’t even take off, a method that would be much less likely to hurt innocent people and would guarantee it would be noticed in time to get the overtime.

Messing with the guidance system, however, is suspect. The fact that he seemed to share in the radical Islamic ideology of people like ISIS, however, make it even more suspect.

Now, let me be clear. This is a Second Amendment site and we talk about guns. A gun won’t do you a damn bit of good against a plane who is out over the ocean when it runs out of fuel or slams into a mountain that it thinks should be 200 miles further east.

But terrorists do not and will not limit themselves to things like this.

This incident, while not explicitly related to firearms in any way, does serve as a reminder that there are people out there who want you dead. They want all of us dead and if they get the chance, they will kill you.

It’s not just radical Islam, either. The truth is, there are a lot of different ideologies that are just fine with killing people for no good reason.

It’s up to you to make sure you’re armed and ready so they don’t get the chance.

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