Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth revealed the three soldiers who were aboard the chopper were a “fairly experienced crew” doing a “required annual night evaluation.”

The call sign was reported as PAT25 which is a specific call sign for the transportation of VIPs in DC area.

PAT US Army Priority Air Transport (Andrews AFB)

Why would a training flight use that call sign? Wouldn’t a different call sign be used if it was just a training evaluation flight?

  • Infamousblt [any]@hexbear.netEnglish
    18·
    9 days ago

    There is basically a zero percent chance any of us will ever actually know the answer to this. If it was a training flight they’ll say it was and okay. If it was not a training flight they’ll still say it was a training flight and even if somehow the real situation is leaked that leak won’t really be trustworthy anyway.

  • InevitableSwing [none/use name]@hexbear.netEnglish
    12·
    9 days ago

    I agree with Infamousblt. I’ll add that Trump controls messaging at all the important agencies now. You can’t trust a single thing they say. All of the heads of the agencies are stooges and flunkies and will lie about everything because that’s what he wants. And - of course - they’ll take the initiative and add their own lies if they feel it’s helpful to them and/or to Trump.

    I saw an example of this coming from the CDC.

    Wikipedia

    [The 2024-2025 Kansas tuberculosis outbreak] is the largest tuberculosis outbreak in the U.S. since documentation began in the 1950s.

    A CDC spokesperson is sickening and uses PR spin.

    Is the Kansas tuberculosis outbreak the largest in U.S. history?

    Kansas health officials called the outbreak “the largest documented outbreak in U.S. history” since the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention began counting cases in the 1950s.

    But a spokesperson for the CDC on Tuesday refuted that claim, noting at least two larger TB outbreaks in recent history. In one, the disease spread through Georgia homeless shelters. Public health workers identified more than 170 active TB cases and more than 400 latent cases from 2015 to 2017. And in 2021, a nationwide outbreak linked to contaminated tissue used in bone transplants sickened 113 patients.