Bob CollinsThe next time you hear someone make one of those cheap lazy-government-worker jokes, remind them of the nameless man (so far) at Midway Airport in Chicago who single-handedly saved a couple of hundred lives this week.
A Southwest Airlines plane had been cleared to take off on one runway, when the pilot of a Delta Airlines jet, ready to roll on another runway, thought it was his turn to take off too.
Both airliners were heading for each other at full power.
The only thing that prevented disaster on Tuesday evening was a guy paying attention.
After his heroism, the controller went back to work.
The National Transportation Safety Board is expected to investigate the incident, but it won’t take long to figure out what happened.
