Friday: Hili dialogue

Welcome to the tail end of the week AND the tail end of the month: it’s Friday, January 31, 2025. It’s also National Hot Chocolate Day, and perhaps I’ll have some, but the best versions are in Spain or Mexico, served with freshly fried churros that must of course be dunked into the thick, rich chocolate.

It’s also the worst food day of the year: Eat Brussels Sprouts Day, Scotch Tape Day (first marketed on January 31, 1930), and Brandy Alexander Day.

Readers are welcome to mark notable events, births, or deaths on this day by consulting the January 31 Wikipedia page.

Da Nooz:

*It looks as if everyone died when an American airlines flight collided with a helicopter Wednesday evening, plunging everyone into the Potomic River. 67 people were killed; 64 on the small plane and three in the Blackhawk helicopter.

Recovery divers were set to plunge back into the frigid Potomac River on Friday as investigators sought to piece together the final moments before a passenger jet collided with an Army helicopter outside Washington, in the deadliest U.S. air crash in 20 years.

Among the questions facing investigators was whether the helicopter had flown outside its designated path as it approached the airport just outside the nation’s capital on Wednesday evening. Four people briefed on the matter but not authorized to speak about it publicly said that the helicopter appeared to have been flying higher than air traffic control had approved.

The inquiry was also expected to look at staffing at the air traffic control tower, which was “not normal” at the time of the crash, according to a preliminary report from the Federal Aviation Administration. The internal F.A.A. report, which was reviewed by The New York Times, said the controller was handling both helicopters and planes in the area, jobs typically assigned to two people. A supervisor combined those duties sometime before 9:30 p.m. and allowed one controller to leave, according to a person briefed on the staffing, who was not authorized to speak publicly.

A recovery operation was launched for the bodies of the 67 people who were killed. The Washington fire department said its divers on Friday would be looking for aircraft parts to help the investigators, and would work on salvaging the wreckage.

Here’s what else to know:

• The plane’s path: Shortly before the crash, the jet’s pilots were asked to pivot their landing route from one runway to another, according to a person briefed on the event and audio recordings of conversations between an air traffic controller and the pilots.
• The investigation: The National Transportation Safety Board recovered the cockpit voice recorder and a flight data recorder from the plane and will have them analyzed. President Trump promised on Thursday that a thorough investigation would be conducted, while also engaging in political attacks on his predecessors.
• The victims: In addition to the many figure skaters aboard the flight, several friends returning to the East Coast from a duck hunt in Kansas were on the plane. A full list of those who died has not yet been released.
• The pilots: The two American Airlines pilots had been flying for years. Robert Isom, the airline’s chief executive, stressed their experience but provided no additional details. Two Army officials confirmed that the pilots of the helicopter — one woman, one man — and a male staff sergeant were killed in the collision.

The Guardian has a video of the moment of collision seen from the air traffic controllers’ base, as well as their reaction; click below if you want to see go to the page with the video. You can hear more extensive audio, including instructions to other planes to avoid the airport, at the AP. 

A schematic of the crash from The Independent:

, . . and the information given by Wichita officials to the press on the morning after the crash (23 minutes long).

*According to the Wall Street Journal, the helicopter either didn’t here or ignored air-traffic control’s instructions to go behind the jet.

Just after 8:47 p.m. on Wednesday, an air-traffic controller at Reagan National Airport relayed a seemingly ordinary inquiry and instruction:

“PAT25, do you have the CRJ in sight?” he asked a U.S. Army Black Hawk helicopter, requesting it keep a lookout for an American Airlines Bombardier jet carrying 60 passengers and four crew members from Wichita, Kan. The helicopter was on a training mission, officials would later say.

*Eight hostages were returned to Israel by Hamas yesterday: three Israelis and five Thai. (In return, Israel released 110 Palestinian prisoners.) The Israeli/Thai swap was so chaotic (see below) that Israel refused to release the many Palestinian “exchange” prisoners until Hamas promised that this kind of chaos would not recur:

Eight hostages abducted during the October 7, 2023, attack on Israel were released by Palestinian terror groups on Thursday under an ongoing ceasefire deal with Hamas, returning to Israel after 482 days in captivity in Gaza. Seven of them were freed in a long, chaotic process in southern Gaza’s Khan Younis that prompted fury in Israel.

The three Israelis are IDF surveillance soldier Agam Berger, 20, and civilians Arbel Yehoud, 29, and Gadi Mozes, 80. The Thai nationals are Thenna Pongsak, Sathian Suwannakham, Sriaoun Watchara, Seathao Bannawat, and Rumnao Surasak.

Yehoud, Mozes and the five Thais were released in an uncontrolled and dangerous handover early Thursday afternoon, outside the destroyed home of slain Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar, surrounded by hundreds of masked gunmen and large, seething crowds.

Eight hostages abducted during the October 7, 2023, attack on Israel were released by Palestinian terror groups on Thursday under an ongoing ceasefire deal with Hamas, returning to Israel after 482 days in captivity in Gaza. Seven of them were freed in a long, chaotic process in southern Gaza’s Khan Younis that prompted fury in Israel.

The three Israelis are IDF surveillance soldier Agam Berger, 20, and civilians Arbel Yehoud, 29, and Gadi Mozes, 80. The Thai nationals are Thenna Pongsak, Sathian Suwannakham, Sriaoun Watchara, Seathao Bannawat, and Rumnao Surasak.

Yehoud, Mozes and the five Thais were released in an uncontrolled and dangerous handover early Thursday afternoon, outside the destroyed home of slain Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar, surrounded by hundreds of masked gunmen and large, seething crowds.

The two Israeli civilians were forced to walk through the crowds, with gunmen at their side, from the vehicles that delivered them and, later, to the Red Cross vehicles, in protracted, chaotic scenes.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the chaotic handover was unacceptable, in a statement immediately after the release. “I view with great severity the shocking scenes during the release of our hostages,” said Netanyahu. “This is further proof of the unimaginable cruelty of the Hamas terrorist organization.”

Israel delayed the slated release of Palestinian prisoners in protest of the chaotic handover, with Netanyahu’s office saying it would not proceed “until the safe passage of our hostages can be guaranteed in the next releases.”

Berger and the Thai hostages were held by the Hamas terror group, while Yehoud and Mozes were held by Palestinian Islamic Jihad.

Here’s a video of Israeli hostage Arbel Yehoud, and what a nightmare it was. Hamas did not have to transfer hostages this way, but wanted to make a spectacle of it: letting the public deride the hostages and terrifying the hostages at the same time. It’s also supposed to be a “show of force” by Hamas, I guess:

*Two of our law professors and free-speech advocates, Anthony Casey and Tom Ginsburg, urge corporations to adopt institutional neutrality in a NYT op-ed called “Corporate leaders need to keep their mouths shut” (archived here; h/t Greg).

After more than a year of exhausting controversies over free expression at colleges and universities, America’s business leaders would do well to take a simple lesson from embattled leaders in higher education:

Keep your mouth shut.

The lesson has become even more important with the recent gravitation of some corporate leaders toward President Trump. Such public fawning, which would have been unthinkable just a few years ago, demonstrates how unprincipled and fickle corporate political positions have always been.

Increasingly, universities have adopted neutrality policies to recommit to their core mission. So can corporations. The key is committing to institutional neutrality, which requires leaders to stay silent on social and political issues that do not directly affect their operations. This means reining in corporate political statements — progressive and conservative — as well as the political activity of chief executives like Elon Musk and political flip-flops by companies like Meta. Our own university, the University of Chicago, committed to this ideal in 1899 and restated that commitment in the seminal Kalven Report of 1967. This has freed individuals in our community to express their own opinions and ideas in lively debate.

For decades, few other universities have made this commitment. But its value for them — and for business corporations — has become clearer over the past year. The Gaza war created a no-win situation for university leaders accustomed to speaking out on political issues. On the one hand, bland institutional statements on current events have no impact, satisfy no one and relegate the institution to a role as a second-rate political actor. On the other, statements with real substance threaten to alienate and silence those who disagree. As a result, more than two dozen schools, including Harvard and the University of Pennsylvania — whose presidents resigned, in part, after stumbling at a congressional hearing on campus antisemitism — have now adopted neutrality policies akin to Chicago’s. More are in the works.

Corporate leaders in the private sector can benefit from these hard lessons.

The authors note that there may be compelling business reasons for companies to speak out (they use the woke Ben & Jerry’s as their example), and companies, like universities, should be free to speak out on matters affecting “the company’s ability to operate.”

Kalven is a good policy for nearly any organization: shut up except on issues that affect your organization’s mission or ability to operate. Besides the University of Chicago, only 29 other American colleges have adopted a Kalven-like policy.

*Finally, a stink flower has grown in Brooklyn, and it bloomed (I’ve added a link):

One by one, visitors to the Brooklyn Botanic Garden pulled out their phones snap pictures of the rare blooming plant before leaning in to brave a whiff of its infamously putrid scent, which resembles that of rotting flesh.

“It smells like feet, cheese and rotten meat. It just smelled like the worst possible combination of smells,” Elijah Blades said. “That was disgusting.”

The rare Amorphophallus gigas — a relative of the Amorphophallus titanum, commonly known as the corpse flower — has bloomed for the first time since arriving in Brooklyn in 2018. Native to Sumatra, the plant is known for its height and carrion scent, which it uses to attract pollinators.

It has hundreds of flowers, both male and female, inside the bloom, and it can take years between blooming events, said gardener Chris Sprindis, who first noticed the inflorescence, or cluster of flowers, around New Year’s Eve. The bloom will last only a few days before it collapses.

“So this is the first time it’s happened here,” Sprindis said. “It’s not going to happen next year. It’s going to be several years before it happens again.”

Look at this thing!

Meanwhile in Dobrzyn, Hili is becoming a Senior Cat:

Hili: With age everything seems more complicated.

Andrzej: I know something about that.

Hili: Z wiekiem wszystko wydaje się bardziej skomplikowane.

Ja: Coś o tym wiem.

*******************

From America’s Cultural Decline Into Idiocy (my Dutch friend also says they’re going to reclaim New Amsterdam):

From I Love Cats:

From Things With Faces:

From Masih; this Iraqui fled his country for freedom and then burned a Qur’an in Stockholm. But that didn’t give him immunity; he was just murdered in Sweden, and I’m pretty damn sure it was by Muslim extremists.

Salwan Momika burned the Quran, arguing that Islam is a violent religion. In a grim twist of irony, he was murdered by those who sought to prove him wrong.

Salwan escaped Iraq in search of safety, hoping to find refuge in Europe. But even there, his voice was silenced by… pic.twitter.com/kL0XZbFTVW

— Masih Alinejad Read More