On September 11, 2001, Lt. Heather Penney was tasked with the following incomprehensible mission: bring down Flight 93 — a hijacked plane that, at the time, was hurdling toward Washington DC.
The catch, however, was this: she had but two weapons.
Her F-16.
And her life.
This from the Washington Post:
Because the surprise attacks were unfolding, in that innocent age, faster than they could arm war planes, Penney and her commanding officer went up to fly their jets straight into a Boeing 757.
“We wouldn’t be shooting it down. We’d be ramming the aircraft,” Penney recalls of her charge that day. “I would essentially be a kamikaze pilot.”
Hear her, now an employee at Lockheed Martin working on the F-35 project, tell the story in living color, in the clip below: