A medevac flight from Roswell Air Center (ROW), New Mexico, to Sierra Blanca Regional Airport (SRR) crossed into an area where there were “GPS jamming activities” by the U.S. military — minutes later, it crashed into a mountain as it was on final approach to its destination. According to the NTSB’s Preliminary Report [PDF], the crew, alongside several other aircraft, experienced issues with their navigation system consistent with the effects of GPS jamming, as reported by Wired.

While the GPS interference seemingly did not directly cause the crash, it’s apparent that it was the first domino in a chain of events that led to the fatal accident. This raises urgent questions about GPS jamming as reported incidents of GPS interference mount across the world.

The preliminary report said that it was a dark, moonless night, meaning it would be difficult for anyone to fly visually. That’s because the dark sky and ground would make it difficult to locate the horizon and could quickly lead to spatial disorientation. The twin-engine Beechcraft King Air propeller plane took off from its base at Roswell Air Center (ROW), New Mexico, at around 11:52 pm. As it was climbing to altitude at 11:54 pm, the pilots requested and received an instrument flight rules (IFR) clearance from Albuquerque Center, the air route traffic control center in charge of the area.

This switch meant that the pilots would now primarily fly the plane using instruments in the cockpit instead of looking outside the windows. This is a normal procedure and is what most passenger airliners use during operations. Furthermore, it seems that the pilots have filed for clearance before they took off, as evidenced by their “as filed” clearance to SRR.

At around 12 midnight, Albuquerque Center told the flight crew that they were 1,000 feet above their assigned altitude. The pilots then said they were correcting their altitude, but they also mentioned that they’ve lost GPS capability. From there, they asked for a heading, and they were told to proceed to heading 275 towards SRR. About a minute after this, air traffic control (ATC) told them to proceed to heading 350 to set them up for a landing on runway 24 at SRR. (Read more from “Ted Stevens Déjà Vu: US Military Accidentally Killed Everybody on Board a Civilian Medevac Flight in New Mexico” HERE)

A leading House Democrat went scorched-earth on insurgent socialists rising within his party, repeatedly telling them to start their own party and accusing them of trying to “hijack” the Democratic Party as a “vessel” for their communist, “anti-American,” open-border platform.

House Intelligence Committee member Josh Gottheimer, D-N.J., a leader of the moderate Blue Dog Coalition, told Fox News on Sunday that the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) is “not Democrats” and rejected the idea that its platform is compatible with the Democratic Party’s.

“Obviously, I’m a very proud, common-sense Democrat, and I don’t think DSA members are Democrats. They’re socialists, right? And I’m all for them having their own party if they want one, but if they’re trying to take over our party, that’s unacceptable to me,” Gottheimer said on “The Big Weekend Show.”

“Their values, their ideas are certainly not in line with ours, and they don’t support our leadership. They’re trying to use the Democratic Party as a vessel for their ideas. And as you heard in some of these conventions, literally, they’re supporting the Communist Manifesto and [Leon] Trotsky, they’re anti-American, they are anti-cop, they don’t believe in borders.”

Gottheimer was referring to man-on-the-street clips of DSA members at the group’s Chicago convention. One socialist said they are organizing a front to get “ICE off our campuses,” while a member of the DSA’s National Political Committee said people such as Gottheimer who call them anti-American do not understand that their platform is the “most American thing you can do.” (Read more from “Dem Leader goes Scorched-Earth on ‘Anti-American’ Socialists for Trying to ‘Hijack’ Party” HERE)