Horizon Airlines worker Richard Russell
There is something incredibly poignant in the story of Richard Russell. Poetic, even. Kind of Holden Caulfield meets Icarus.
Russell, of course, is the Horizon Airlines baggage worker who surreptitiously made off in one of his employer’s planes this past weekend, crashing it into a remote island, but not before fulfilling his dream of flight and executing what by professional accounts were impressive aerobatic stunts.
I don’t mean to glorify suicide, but the story of a very earthbound man who lugged heavy baggage for a living and tried to remain cheerful about it — well, it moves me very much. Ultimately, he obviously came to feel he couldn’t go on without grasping for his dream — short-lived as he knew happiness would be. He fought gravity. It was the stuff of fiction — worthy of Salinger, Foster Wallace or even just a pop ballad: the sad man in the sky who opened his eyes to dream he could fly.
A plain fellow, unleashed by an act of sheer bravado, released of his earthly baggage, free to soar loop-de-loops. It was a deed no sane person would have encouraged or sanctioned; sad, but hopeful, too. Who wouldn’t be moved? This guy didn’t senselessly grab and crash a plane, he executed what air traffic professionals called “impressive” aerial maneuvers. It was balletic — dancing in the arms of death.
It’s heartbreaking, of course, that Mr. Russell, who dreamed of flight, didn’t just go for his pilot’s license. But of course that would not have had operatic quality. Richard Russell was a cog in the machine, who briefly harnessed the machine’s power to his own advantage. He knew he’d punched a one-way ticket; “I don’t plan to land,” he told air traffic control. The earth is 4.5 billion years old. Human life is less than a flash. Who’s to say Richard Russell wasted his?
He choreographed performance art on a grand scale. It’s tragic, but tragi-poetic. Like Icarus, he flew only briefly. But at least he flew. Or as Oscar Wilde said, “Never regret thy fall, O Icarus of the fearless flight. For the greatest tragedy of all is never to feel the burning light.” Mostly, life conditions us to avoid that feeling. To not even know it’s missing.
Rest in peace Richard Russell, who took us on his strange journey.