ELI5, why do problematic flights require a fighter jet escort?

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What could a fighter jet do if a plane goes rogue in a terrorism situation. Surely they can’t push the plane in a certain direction to prevent them causing harm the plane is too big and that’s a recipe for disaster all round. Shooting the plane down has its own complications especially if flying over populated area.

What could they actually do in a code red situation?

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Anonymous 0 Comments

If the plane is hijacked and terrorists are in control, the fighter jets will absolutely shoot the plane down. It’s essentially a lose-lose situation, where shooting down the plane will kill all onboard and potentially many on the ground, and doing nothing could result in a magnitude more fatalities like 9/11.

The idea is to stop the jet with the least amount of fatalities, such as bringing it down over the ocean vs over a populated area. If they did have to bring it down over a populated area it’s to keep it from getting to a major population center ie, Upstate NY vs New York City

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