29岁的Richard Russel是航空公司的地勤人员,没有飞行执照,上周五在西雅图机场偷了一架民航飞机飞上天,一边和控制中心的人有一搭没一搭地聊天(因为知道了结局,这些对话显得莫名的诗意),一边展示各种空中特技。飞行了90分钟后, 在Ketron岛坠毁。
他时而感叹夕阳下奥林匹克山脉的壮美;时而询问背着死去孩子在海里游弋的鲸鱼妈妈(上周上了新闻)的坐标;时而抱怨头晕;时而又开玩笑说自己落地后可能会被终身监禁。有时候他又会陷入自怨自艾,“Man, I’m sorry about this. I hope this doesn’t ruin your day… I’m glad you’re not, you know, screwing up everyone else’s day on account of me.”
当调度人员试图帮助他着陆时,他说,我不知道,我不想,我大概希望也许就这样了。“I don’t know, man. I don’t want to. I was kind of hoping that was going to be it, you know.”
聊天中,他还向关心他的人道歉,说自己只是一个破碎的人:”I’ve got a lot of people that care about me. It’s going to disappoint them to hear that I did this. I would like to apologise to each and every one of them. Just a broken guy, got a few screws loose, I guess. Never really knew it, until now.”
他说他想在空中获得片刻的宁静(moment of serenity),可是景色又飞逝得太快。
他说“我并不想伤害任何人,只是想听你在我耳边低语甜蜜的琐事” – “I don’t want to hurt no one. I just want you to whisper sweet nothings in my ear”.
录音的最后,他轻松地说: “I think I am going to try to do a barrel roll and if that goes good then I am going to go nose down and call it a night.”
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媒体报道中提到他的工作待遇,他的朋友说他曾经抱怨机场付给他的工资低于其他机场地勤的最低时薪,想去做别的,可是又很喜爱这份工作带来的旅行机会。去年12月他在优管上上传了一个视频,介绍他的工作(搬运行李)很辛苦,可是他也得以做很多有趣的事情,尤其是,访问他最爱的地方。
“In a video that appears to have been posted by Mr. Russell in December, he introduced himself as a ground service agent. “That means I lift a lot of bags,” he said. “Like, a lot of bags. So many bags.”
But “it allows me to do some pretty cool things, too,” he added, segueing to footage of a flight tour over Ketchikan, Alaska, followed by images of several countries including France, Ireland and Mexico.
Most importantly, he concluded, “I get to visit those I love most.””
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出事之后,Richard的视频下面多了好多好多评论。有人说,“Fly on, Rich, fly on”,有人说,“you did the barrel roll that we all wish we could”,有人说,“I wish you could have seen that orca and her baby. Fly in peace Sky King”。
除了在我自己的微博下面,我基本没有看到有人指责他不负责任的自杀方法(这些指责大致的逻辑是,“白瞎了一架飞机,死都还要其他人来给自己买单”)(另一个人则回复说,“揭开生活的合理性的面纱,底下是黑洞洞的存在的虚无。小行星撞了地球,大概也有人想追责想赔偿吧”)。一方面,他的绝望与破碎,当然没有必要浪漫化。虽然具体动机还有待调查,但是对话中也已经透露出了他受到心理问题的困扰。媒体报道中,也将民航工作人员,尤其是较低收入的地勤人员的心理健康当作一个重点来说。
另一方面,太多人情不自禁地浪漫化,无论是优管上还是微博评论里,人们希望他能看到心心念念的虎鲸妈妈,希望他能一直飞下去。大概是因为在某种意义上,他做了一件许多人内心渴望却没有勇气做的事,从日复一日的枯燥工作中解脱出来,不顾后果地自由翱翔一回,或直面无意义的虚空。内心有小小的感动,并不代表真的会去做这样极端的事,或者说认为这样做是“对”的,而只是在冷酷的现实中保有一点点疯狂的幻想和隐藏的绝望罢了。
“how everything turns away,
Quite leisurely from the disaster”
– W. H. Auden, “Musee des Beaux Arts”