LAX: Second sighting of person wearing jet pack prompts new investigation

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LAX: Second sighting of person wearing jet pack prompts new investigation

By Richard Winton
Updated
This is the second time someone has been spotted wearing a jet pack in an LAX flight path.

This is the second time someone has been spotted wearing a jet pack in an LAX flight path.Credit: Edwina Pickles

Los Angeles International Airport officials are investigating reports of someone wearing a jet pack Wednesday in the flight path, the second such report in a month.

An air traffic controller radioed a pilot Wednesday afternoon warning of a man wearing a jet pack about 6,500 feet. The precise location was unknown. LAX and Federal Aviation Administration officials said they could not comment further.

The FBI is investigating the latest sighting, according to sources familiar with the latest probe. Federal officials are also investigating an earlier incident in which two commercial pilots said they saw a man in a jetpack flying around the eastern approach to LAX six weeks ago.

In the August 29 incident, the control tower at LAX received reports about the jet pack around 6:45 pm.

"Tower, American 1997. We just passed a guy in a jet pack," an American Airlines pilot stated in a call to the control tower.

"American 1997, OK, thank you. Were they off to your left or right side?" the tower operator answered.

"Off the left side, maybe 300 yards or so, about our altitude," the pilot responded.

"We just saw the guy pass us by in the jet pack," a pilot from Jet Blue Airways then told the tower, which warned another pilot about the sighting.

"Only in L.A.," the air traffic controller said at one point.

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