Featured Image Credit: Sam Sweeney/ABC News / Kevin Carter/Contributor/Getty
The pilot who tried to crash Alaska Airlines Flight 2059 with 83 passengers onboard has shared his side of the story.
Joseph David Emerson faces over 80 charges including reckless endangerment following the flight en route to San Francisco, California, from Everett, Washington, US in October 2023.
Two days before the flight, the 44-year-old said he and his friends took psychedelic mushrooms - a Class A drug that can cause hallucinations - to mark the anniversary of his best friend's death.
However, he said that the effects lingered longer than expected, making him feel uneasy as he arrived at the airport.
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Once in the cockpit, the pilot felt 'trapped' and disoriented, believing that he was stuck in a non-real situation and wouldn't see his family again.
'There was a feeling of being trapped, like, "Am I trapped in this airplane and now I'll never go home?"' Emerson told ABC News.
He texted his friend his fears who told him to carry out some breathing exercises to calm down.
But once his phone read the text in his ear, it sent him over the edge.
'That's kind of where I flung off my headset, and I was fully convinced this isn't real and I'm not going home,' he recalled.
'And then, as the pilots didn't react to my completely abnormal behaviour in a way that I thought would be consistent with reality, that is when I was like, this isn't real. I need to wake up.'
He explained that when he saw two red handles in front of him, he thought pulling them would help him 'wake up' from the hallucination.
'And thinking that I was going to wake up, thinking this is my way to get out of this non-real reality, I reached up and I grabbed them, and I pulled the levers,' he continued.
'What I thought is: "This is going to wake me up".'
But it turns out these handles were the engine shut-off controls, which would have endangered all lives on board.
Emerson added: "I know what those levers do in a real airplane and I need to wake up from this. You know, it's 30 seconds of my life that I wish I could change, and I can't."
Fortunately, the pilots stopped him before any damage occurred and the pilot's 'physical touch' snapped him out of it.
He was told to get out of the cockpit, so he sat in the flight attendant's seat drinking directly from a coffee pot.
But it didn't stop there as his hallucinations returned.
"At some point I thought maybe this isn't real, and maybe I can wake myself up by just jumping out, like that freefall feeling that you have."
Emerson described attempting to open the cabin door, but luckily a flight attendant stopped him and woke him out of his trip.
He then asked to be handcuffed in case he potentially caused any further harm.
Once the plane landed, Emerson was taken into custody where he spent 45 days behind bars before being released on bond.
His jail physician explained that he had suffered from hallucinogen-persisting perception disorder (HPPD), which causes continuous visual hallucinations in first-time psychedelic users.
