'Berserk' JetBlue captain's pilot father died in 1995 private plane crash

'Berserk' JetBlue captain's bizarre behaviour began at takeoff, according to criminal complaint

• Clayton Osbon, 49, had been JetBlue captain for 12 years
  
• Federal criminal complaint suggests Osbon was late to JFK and missed crew briefing
  
• Came out of toilet telling passengers: 'Say your prayers, say your prayers' while on a packed flight to Las Vegas
  
• Screamed 'Iraq, al Qaeda, terrorism, we're all going down'
• Four passengers, including a retired NYPD sergeant, jumped the man
  
• Father Ronald died in a 1995 plane crash
• Osbon has been suspended and charged with interfering with a flight crew
• Friends and family of co-pilot Jason Dowd hail his actions as heroic
  

By Daily Mail Reporter

Published: 10:20 EST, 29 March 2012 | Updated: 20:58 EST, 29 March 2012

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A suspended JetBlue captain who had to be restrained by passengers during a mid-air meltdown began behaving bizarrely as his flight took off on Tuesday, according to a federal criminal complaint.

Passengers aboard flight 191 watched in horror as Clayton Osbon, 49, ran through the aisle screaming 'say your prayers' and banged on the cockpit door after being locked out by his co-pilot on the New York to Las Vegas flight.

But a newly-obtained complaint suggests Osbon began acting strangely long before the incident, having arrived late to John F Kennedy airport, missing the crew briefing and speaking of religion and needing to 'focus' as the plane departed.

Scroll down for videos

Clayton Osbon, pictured left after being removed from the flight in restraints, and right, in his hometown, lost his father Ronald in a plane crash in April, 1995

The veteran pilot, pictured, who has been a JetBlue captain for 12 years, started flying as a teenager with his father Ronald

According to NBC News, Osbon mentioned 'being evaluated by someone' to the first officer, who he asked to take controls as he made incoherent comments and said, 'things just don't matter'.

The network reports Osbon 'yelled at air traffic controllers to be quiet and admonished the first officer for talking on the radio'.

According to court documents, Osbon became increasingly incoherent on board, and co-pilot Jason Dowd Dowd was 'really worried' when Osbon told him 'we need to take a leap of faith'.

Osbon is said to have spoken of sins he committed at the flight's destination, saying, 'We're not going to Vegas.'

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Earlier reports claimed Osbon started saying 'completely unrelated numbers' before he 'began giving what the (first officer) described as a sermon'.

Concerned about Osbon's behavior, Dowd suggested they invite an off-duty JetBlue captain who was flying as a passenger to come into the cockpit, but instead, Osbon left the cockpit and later sprinted down the cabin yelling jumbled remarks about September 11 and Iran, documents and witnesses say.

While there, he 'aggressively grabbed a flight attendant's hands' and brought up the '150 souls on board' before trying in vain to get back into the cockpit.

He screamed 'say your prayers, say your prayers' at terrified passengers after running up and down the aisle shouting 'Iraq, al-Qaeda, terrorism, we're all going down.'

Friends and family say there had been no signs Osbon, who lives with his wife and son Richmond Hill, Georgia, pictured, may suffer from a break down

Osbon has over 30 years experience of planes and enjoyed flying his single-engine airplane, pictured, in his spare time

The off-duty captain then joined Dowd, and from inside the locked cockpit, which Osbon tried to re-enter by banging on the door, the co-pilot gave an order through the intercom to restrain Osbon, according to the documents, which don't mention Dowd by name.

Details of the first officer's account were revealed in a complaint report written by John Whitworth, a special agent for the FBI.

Four make passengers wrestled Osbon to the ground, and Dowd diverted the flight from New York to Amarillo, Texas. No one onboard was seriously injured.

Osbon's wife of seven years Connye has been interviewed by the FBI

Federal prosecutors have charged Osbon, has been a JetBlue captain for 12 years, with interfering with a flight crew and he is under medical evaluation at an Amarillo hospital.

That charge carries a potential sentence of up to 20 years in prison.

Co-pilot Jason Dowd is staying out of the public eye for now, but a wave of overnight fame - much like 'Miracle on the Hudson' Captain Chesley Sullenberger - likely awaits. JetBlue says the decision on whether to go public is up to him, but the airline is not commenting more out of respect for his privacy.

And while Dowd's friends and relatives say he doesn't want to be considered a hero - that's exactly what many are calling him.

His mother, Jean Dowd, told ABC News: 'He's been under pressure before with other things, and he handles it very well.

'We are very proud. But that was the job he was paid to do. And we are always proud of him. We have been proud of him his whole life.'

'I'm glad for those people he was the co-pilot that day,' echoed Dowd's mother-in-law, Ruth Ann Kostal.

Jason Dowd, who lives in his hometown of Salem, Ohio, with his wife and their two young children, hasn't been able to come home yet because he's still being interviewed by federal authorities in New York, Kostal said.

'I can see him being a hero. It does not surprise me one bit that he acted so professionally,' said Patty Eaton, a secretary at the church Dowd's family attends.

Details of Osbon's bizarre behaviour follow news he lost his father in a 1995 plane crash.

The veteran pilot started flying as a teenager with his father Ronald who was killed after crashing his small plane while enroute to look for treasure in Fort Lauderdale, according to a 1995 story in the Washington Island Observer.

Telling their story: Tony Antolino, right, and Paul Babakitis, left, two of the passengers who helped take down the unruly pilot, spoke about the ordeal with Piers Morgan last night

Restrained: Four passengers on the flight jumped onto the captain after being urged to by a flight attendant and held him down until the plane made an emergency landing in Texas

Outnumbered: The captain was subdued thanks to the help of passengers on the flight 'packed with burly men' heading to the 2012 International Security Conference in Las Vegas

Ronald Osbon's personal flight on April 14, 1995, began in West Bend, Wisconsin, he flew through two stops without incident until he was cleared to descend from 8,000 feet to 4,000 feet.

At that point, Ronald said his right engine was 'kicking in and out', according to the National Transportation Safety Board report.

He radioed that 'he was losing power on both engines, and was out of gas,' the reports states

The twin engine plane crashed about three miles from the Daytona Beach airport killing Ronald and his business associate.

The airline's spokeswoman Allison Steinberg said today that Osbon was taken off active duty pending a review of the incident.

Meanwhile friends and family say there had been no signs Osbon, who lives with his wife and son Richmond Hill, Georgia, may suffer from a break down.

Osbon has been married to his wife Connye since 2005, according to the pilot's Facebook page.

Mrs Osbon, speaking to ABC News, warned that there might be more to what happened aboard the flight.

She told the network: 'There are several different sides to every story. Just keep that in mind'.

Lost control: Osbon, 49, screamed 'say your prayers, say your prayers' at horrified passengers after running up and down the aisle shouting 'Iraq, al-Qaeda, terrorism, we're all going down'

Ranting: Clayton Osbon filmed here screaming at passengers on the flight from JFK to Las Vegas

But she added, 'I don't have a clue... I have no idea what's going on.I haven't spoken with him.'

Bud Lawyer, Osbon's next-door neighbor in Georgia where he resides with his wife and son, told the Associated Press that he knows Osbon does attend church but rarely spoke of it, and the two would only casually talk about events in the Middle East.

'He wouldn't intentionally hurt anyone,' Lawyer said. 'He's a kind-hearted, generous, loving teddy bear. It's totally out of character for this to happen to him.'

But witness accounts tell of a disturbed man, who about three hours into the flight, began behaving erratically, randomly talking with passengers on his way back to the cockpit before discovering he had been locked out after Dowd changed the security code behind him.

ANOTHER MELTDOWN IN THE SKY

A female passenger aboard a US Airways flight was arrested after attacking crew members before being wrestled to the floor yesterday.

US Airways spokesman Bill McGlashen said: 'All I know is that during the flight the passenger became disruptive to the point where the crew took the precautionary measure of restraining her in the cabin.'

The passenger on flight 1697 from Charlotte, North Carolina, to Fort Myers, Florida kicked, scratched and spit on crew members, according to Raleigh station WCNC.

The woman complained of being scared of flying shortly before she became violent, flight attendants said.

The woman left her seat and knocked one flight attendant to the ground, the TV station reported. One female flight attendant had bruises and bandages on her arms in addition to scratch marks. 

A Lee County sheriff's deputy on board the flight helped tackle the woman. The woman was screaming and crying while she was checked by medics in the terminal before being taken away.

When he went back to the cockpit and realized he had been locked out, a passenger told ABC News Osbon began screaming 'let me in'.

Mark Sellouk told CBS: 'He's banging on the door, yelling at the first officer, I think his name is Steve, 'Bring the throttle to idle! Bring it to idle! Bring it to idle! We're going down, we're all going to die! Pray to Jesus. Open this goddamn door!'

Tony Antolino, a 40-year-old executive for a security firm, said the captain seemed disoriented and agitated, then began yelling about an unspecified threat linked to Iran, Iraq and Afghanistan.

'They're going to take us down, they're taking us down, they're going to take us down. Say the Lord's prayer, say the Lord's prayer,' the captain screamed, according to Antolino.

Antolino, who said he sat in the 10th row, said he and three others tackled the captain as he ran for the cockpit door.

The passengers pinned the captain and held him down while the plane landed at Rick Husband Amarillo International Airport.

Even though he was outnumbered, it was no easy task to restrain the captain Paul Babakitis, a former New York City police officer, told CBS.

'We're talking about a guy about 6 foot 3, 6 foot 4, about 260lbs, solid as a rock, short cropped hair, bent with a cause, which we don't know what his cause is,' says Babakitis.

It was a long 30 minute wait before the plane was safely on the ground.

'That's how we landed,' he said. 'We just grabbed a different body part and sat on top of him quite literally. There were four of us on top of him. ... Everybody else kind of took a seat and that's how we landed.' said Antolino.

Antolino said that the plastic zip ties provided by the crew proved useless, and the men were forced to used seat belt and passenger's personal belts to try to restrain the man. 

'The real hero here is the co-pilot, he had the instincts to recognise that something was going wrong in the cockpit and he managed to somehow persuade him out of the cockpit. 

'That really was what completely averted what could have been a tragedy yesterday.'

Unplanned stop: This maps shows the route the Las Vegas bound flight 191 took after taking off from New York's JFK at 7.28am on Tuesday

The pilot was restrained and carted off the flight when it landed in Texas

Paul Babakitis, a retired police officer, said he and other passengers sprung into action to stop Osbon.

Babakitis told CNN's Piers Morgan: 'I felt if he got in the cockpit, he was going to try to take that plane down, and not for a safe landing'.

An off-duty airline captain who just happened to be a passenger on the flight went to the flight deck and took over the duties of the ill captain 'once on the ground,' the airline said in a statement.

JetBlue CEO Dave Barger, appearing on NBC's Today this morning and said that he knew the captain personally for a long time.

EMERGENCY CALL TO AIR TRAFFIC CONTROL REVEALED:

Pilot: JetBlue 191, we are going to need authorities and medical assistance at the airport

Air traffic: Yes sir, we are standing by for you

At landing

Pilot: Can we request medical and security as soon as possible

Air traffic: We've got medical and security standing by

Air traffic hands over to Amarillo police

Pilot: Can you guys come up here and arrest *****?

Police: 'We're coming up to the door as we speak, can you have someone open it for me on the inside? We have medical and personnel on the ground on standby

Pilot: Thanks, will do

Scroll down to listen to the full three minute conversation between air traffic control and the pilot

He said that there were no signs that suggested that the captain could suffer from an in-flight meltdown. He was a 'consummate professional' Barger said.

'It was a true team effort at 35,000ft yesterday,' Barger said, praising the response by passengers and crew.

He described it as a medical situation that turned into a security one. He said he did not think anyone from the company has since talked to Osbon.

'The captain’s now in the hands of medical care, obviously, under the custody of the FBI.' Barger said told Today program.

'I’ve known the captain personally for a long period of time and there’s been no indication of this at all.'

Josh Redick, a passenger seated near the middle of the jet, added: 'He was irate. He was spouting off about Afghanistan and souls and al Qaeda'.

New Yorker Gabriel Schonzeit, who was seated in the third row of the plane, told USA Today that Osbon had started 'shouting, "Iraq, al-Qaeda, terrorism, we're all going down" during his mid-flight meltdown.

Mr Schonzeit added: 'It seemed like he went crazy'.

Passenger Jazaria Felder told CBS: 'There was a lady next to me named Desere, and she was praying the whole time. She grabbed me, and I think because of her, I calmed down, because I was ready to run. I don't know where I was going, but I was ready to run!!'

Grant Heppes, a 22-year-old passenger also from New York said that the man was wearing a JetBlue uniform, and that he started to become disruptive when he was barred from getting back inside the cockpit.

One passenger told Fox 5 News the pilot was in the cabin trying to storm the cockpit.

'I saw a guy wearing a pilot's uniform run down the aisle screaming and yelling and banging on the cockpit door to let him in,' the witness said.

In custody: The unidentified captain is removed in restraints from the flight to a waiting ambulance

Outburst: Passengers said the pilot lost it after he went back to the cockpit and realized he had been locked out by his co-pilot

The witness, Fox 5 News reports, said the man was screaming, 'Say your prayers! Say your prayers!'

Heidi Karg, another passenger on the flight, told CNN that the man was desperately trying to get into the cockpit, shouting 'I need the code, gimme the code, I need to get in there.'

A flight attendant quickly got onto the intercom and called on passengers to 'restrain him'.

'Nobody knew what to do because he is the captain of the plane,' said Don Davis, the owner of a Ronkonkoma, N.Y.-based wireless broadband manufacturer who was traveling to Sin City for a security industry conference.

'You're not just going to jump up and attack the captain,' Davis said.

But a group of male passengers, including a retired NYPD sergeant and former prison security guard David Gonzalez jumped up and held the man down.

'I knew there were about 130 people on the plane...families, kids...and I thought, this is not going to happen on my plane,' Mr Gonzalez told ABCNews.com.

The 50-year-old said he knew he act quickly when he saw the captain reached for the emergency exit.

'I just didn't want him opening up that door,' Gonzalez told ABC News. 'I knew if he got in there, we wouldn't be sitting here now.'

Brave:  David Gonzalez, pictured, a former New York City corrections officer helped to restrained the captain by choking him until he passed out. The 50-year-old who weighs 300lbs then sat on Osbon until they landed

Mr Gonzalez said he went to assist the flight attendant and asked the pilot what his problem was.

Mr Gonzalez said the man replied, 'You'd better start praying right now' and was shouting about Iraq and Iran.

'I said, 'I'm going to show you Iraq and Iran right now,' and I just took him in a choke hold,' Mr Gonzalez said.

'I started to cut his windpipe off so he couldn't get any air.'

MEDICAL BACKGROUND PROBE

The FBI was coordinating an investigation with the airport police, Amarillo police, the FAA and the TSA, according to agency spokeswoman Lydia Maese in Dallas.

She declined to comment on whether any arrests have been made.

As a result of the incident, the FAA will review the captain's medical certificate - essentially a good housekeeping seal of approval that the pilot is healthy.

All pilots working for scheduled airlines must have a first class medical certificate.

The certificates are required to be renewed every year if the pilot is under 40, every six months if 40 or over.

To obtain a certificate, the pilot must receive a physical examination by an FAA-designated medical examiner that includes questions about the pilot's psychological condition.

The medical examiner can order additional psychological testing.

Pilots are required to disclose all existing physical and psychological conditions and medications.

In 2008, an Air Canada co-pilot had a mental breakdown on a flight from Toronto to London and was forcibly removed from the cockpit, restrained and sedated.

A flight attendant with flying experience helped the pilot safely make an emergency landing in Ireland, and none of the 146 passengers and nine crew members on board were injured.

The father-of-five from Pennsylvania described feeling the man get weak and he passed out about three minutes later.

Mr Gonzalez and the group of men restrained the pilot using seat belts and offered him some water when he came to, reports ABC News.

'If he got a second wind, I'd have to apply more pressure and I didn't want to hurt him," Gonzalez said.

'I just wanted to get him calm, get the plane down and get him some medical assistance.'

The flight had been packed with heavily built men heading to the 2012 International Security Conference in Las Vegas held for professionals working in ‘law enforcement, border protection and campus security’.

It has media sponsors including The Counter Terrorist magazine, Homeland Security Newswire and Government Security News.

One witness told CBS: 'He picked the wrong plane.  Huge guys just tackled him. The response was Olympics kind of stuff.'

When the pilot had been safely removed passengers thanked Mr Gonzalez for his bravery and asked to take photos with him, reports ABC News.

'It's amazing how people thanked me,' Gonzalez said. 'I don't find myself a hero. I just couldn't take that. I got that spark. I knew I had to get involved.'

'Someone next to me said he was saying something about bombs,' passenger Tiffany Lee, a 26-year-old Las Vegas resident told the Post.

'It was so scary. People around me were freaking out a little bit. The girl next to me was saying, 'Oh my god, what If I never talk to my fiancé again?’

CNN quotes one passenger, Tom Murphy, as saying that the captain had come into the cabin and initially tried to break into a locked bathroom, then on the cockpit door.

The flight attendants had tried to take the pilot to the back of the plane, but he broke free and ran to the front, threatening to blow up the plane and saying there was a bomb on board, reports CNN.

The pilot had also urged for someone to restrain him, she said. 'We heard the word 'bomb'.

Helped arrived once the plane landed in Texas to escort the captain off the flight

The captain who appears to have suffered from a 'mental breakdown' was taken to an Amarillo hospital

The unruly pilot was taken to hospital with a police escort after being removed from the flight

JetBlue CEO Dave Barger, appearing on NBC's Today, said that he knew the captain personally for a long time and that he was a 'consummate professional'

Laurie Dhue, a former Fox News Channel anchor who was on board the flight, told the network passengers could hear the pilot using the words 'Afghanistan' and 'Israel' during the commotion.

The flight was taking passengers to Las Vegas for a security convention when the plane was diverted at around 10am

MENTAL BREAKDOWN IN THE SKIES

The Jet Blue captain’s episode is the second time this month that a member of flight crew’s mental breakdown has grounded a flight. 

On March 9, an American Airlines flight attendant screamed ‘don’t blame me if we crash’ and ranted about 9/11 over the intercom during the pre-flight safety briefing.

First class passengers on the flight from Dallas-Fort Worth to Chicago had to help cabin crew restrain the attendant, who suffered from bipolar disorder.

Terrified onlookers called 911, telling police that the flight crew were plotting to crash the plane over the intercom.

The plane was turned around and taxied back to the gate where the woman was arrested. 

In August, 2010, Jet Blue flight attendant Steven Slater ranted over the intercom at a passenger who stood up while his plane was taxiing – before grabbing beer from the emergency cart, activating the emergency exit slide and jumping down it. 

The 38-year-old was later arrested at his home after fleeing the tarmac at JFK airport.
In January 2008, an Air Canada flight attendant had to help make an emergency landing in Ireland after the co-pilot had a nervous breakdown.

The co-pilot had to be dragged from the cockpit after he started ranting and become ‘uncooperative’ in the cockpit.

He was sedated by doctors onboard the flight from Toronto to London, while the hostess who held a commercial pilot’s license took the co-pilot’s seat and helped land the plane at Shannon airport in Ireland.

JetBlue said the captain had a 'medical situation' and was taken to an Amarillo hospital.

A spokeswoman Allison Steinberg said today  that Osbon was taken off active duty pending a review of the incident.

According to his Linkedin profile, Osbon is also the director of Body By Vi, a company which claims to help people to a better 'life through health and financial prosperity'.

Another ambulance was also called to check on a passenger who was experiencing chest pains.

JetBlue says an off-duty captain who happened to be aboard the plane went to the flight deck and took over the duties of the ill captain 'once on the ground.'

Flight 191 had 135 passengers and five crew members when it took off from John F. Kennedy Airport at about 7.28am, JetBlue said.

Shane Helton, 39, of Quinlan, Oklahoma, said he saw emergency and security personnel coming on and off the plane as it sat on the tarmac at the airport.

'They pulled one guy out on a stretcher and put him in an ambulance,' said Helton, who went to the airport with his fiancée to see one of her sons off as he joined the Navy.

Helton said the ambulance then sat on the tarmac next to the plane for more than 30 minutes.

Some medical experts dismissed the statement that the pilot had suffered a panic attack and said it was more like to have been a toxic reaction to infection, drugs or even an encephalitic event caused by a brain tumor.

The airline said the passengers had to await another plane to take them on to their destination.

John Cox, a former pilot who is now a safety expert, told USA TODAY that the other pilot on the flight could have landed the plane safely alone without assistant from the off-duty captain. 

Mr Cox said crew members are trained to restrain combative passengers under a program that could have applied to the pilot.

'The same training to restrain an abusive passenger that presents a physical threat could be utilized against a crew member,' said Cox, as president of Safety Operation Systems.

'It was great that there was another captain that was on the flight that could assist the first officer. Had he not been there, though, the first officer is completely capable and trained to land the aircraft. There was never a risk to the passengers.'

Flight 191 from JFK to Las Vegas today diverted to Amarillo, Texas after pilots kicked the captain out of the cock pit (file photo)

VIDEO: Footage claims to show the captain going berserk on the plane. He is then escorted off Flight 191 

VIDEO: Air Traffic Control conversation with Flight 191's cockpit as it is brought in to land

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