He says that, “No sane person would do what he is doing.”
The insanity defense might be a good idea.
And here is the landing, and the inevitable freakout.
U.S. Capitol Police said that a small gyrocopter with one occupant landed on the West Lawn of the Capitol on Wednesday afternoon.
One person has been detained, Capitol Police spokeswoman Kimberly Schneider said in an e-mail.
Eyewitnesses in Capitol offices reported seeing police run toward the aircraft and take the pilot away. The small craft landed in the middle of the West Front Lawn, where the annual Christmas tree and Fourth of July concert stage are set up.
All was calm as of about 1:45 p.m., but police blocked access to the lawn. Schneider, at about 3:13 p.m., sent out an e-mail saying bomb squad had cleared the craft and was preparing to move it to a secure location.
………
The Tampa Bay Times wrote about Doug Hughes, a 61-year-old mailman from Florida, who planned to fly to the Capitol.
From their report:His stated intent: to buzz through the air at 45 miles per hour at about 300 feet up in an ultralight gyrocopter toward Washington, D.C., toward protected airspace, where, if his plan works, he’ll land on the lawn of the United States Capitol building and deliver the mail.
Of course, Doug Hughes might be shot out of the sky. He knows this. He has thought about it day and night for more than two years, wrestling with the tiniest details of his insane plan.
“No sane person,” he said, “would do what I’m doing.”
Rather unsurprisingly, he is currently in custody.
I don’t expect a long jail sentence, but I would expect that he is likely to be fired by the US Post Office, and his pension might be at risk, and he is going to be in for a world of petty harassment by the authorities.