Maybe I’m overreacting, but I think it’s better to be prepared with TRUTH, JUST IN CASE we suffer another incident where our national defense goes AWOL, as it did on 9/11/01:
Langley jets grounded on Sept. 14
The stand down is scheduled so airmen can review safety procedures.
BY STEPHANIE HEINATZ | 757-247-7821, September 6, 2007
http://www.dailypress.com/news/local/hampton/dp-now-langley.0906,0,3833474.story
U P D A T E!!!
February 17, 2008
The Daily Press link is no longer available, and so I found an article from the Air Force Times which verifies that the Sept. 14th stand down was a reaction to the "missing nukes" story and questions around procedural , erh, problems:
ACC orders commandwide standdown Friday
By Bruce Rolfsen - Staff writer, Posted : Monday Sep 10, 2007
[...] Command boss Gen. Ronald Keys ordered the Sept. 14 safety standdown in the wake of the Aug. 30 nuclear incident at Minot Air Force Base, N.D., in which six cruise missiles armed with nuclear warheads were loaded onto a B-52H and then flown to Barksdale Air Force Base, La., without anyone on the ground or bomber realizing the nuclear weapons were on the plane. It was not until the B-52H was parked at Barksdale that ground crews discovered the cruise missiles were carrying real warheads.
[...] Just how serious Keys takes the lapse of regulations at Minot is reflected in the fact that the safety stand-down is the first commandwide safety day in recent memory. In the past, the command has singled out specific types of aircraft for safety days and in 1997 the Department of Defense held a departmentwide safety review day.
http://www.airforcetimes.com/news/2007/09/airforce_aircombatcommand_standdown_070807/
This strange story might not ever get coverage, but should. Nuclear missiles flying from North Dakota to Louisiana without anyone knowing about it? Don't forget Friday's "stand-down." (See my Sept. 7th post "Heads Up re Stand Down" for a report on this decision by Air Combat Command.