Update May 8: Kid to be interviewed by police, Mom on the way? here.
Update May 5: Teen released into care of California family service agency, here.
Update May 1: The latest episode of the Somali stowaway family soap opera, here.
Update April 29: The story is turning into a soap opera! CAIR involved too! Click here. Voice of America story contradicts CAIR, here.
Update April 26: Mom found in Ethiopia, wants to come to US, here.
Update April 23: Father: Allah protected son. Still no word on why father never called authorities about his missing son, here.
Of course you’ve seen the news. Authorities are stunned that a teenage boy who stowed himself away in the wheel well of a plane that crossed the Pacific Ocean to Maui actually survived the ordeal.
CNN is now reporting that the boy is from Somalia and wanted to get home to his biological mother in Africa. It reminds us (rather dramatically) that not all refugees are happy to be in America.
From CNN:
(CNN) — A 15-year-old boy who survived a flight from California to Hawaii by hitching a ride in the plane’s wheel well said he was trying to get to Somalia to see his mother, a law enforcement official told CNN on Tuesday.
The teen, who has not yet been identified, spent more than six hours on the ground before the Maui-bound jet took off, another government official says.
The boy jumped an airport fence in San Jose, California, shortly after 1 a.m. on Sunday, hours before Hawaiian Airlines Flight 45 took off at 7:55 a.m., the official said.
The official, speaking on the condition of anonymity, didn’t know when the teen climbed into the wheel well, but said the plane already was at the airport at 1 a.m.
Investigators say they don’t think the teen knew where the plane was heading and just went to the nearest aircraft.
There are a bunch of reports on the case, thanks to ‘pungentpeppers’ for sending them.
The general consensus of the stories is that the teen was unhappy living under crowded conditions in a house with his biological father, a stepmother and a huge batch of siblings. He had also recently been in some trouble in school. The reports vary on how long he has been in the US.
Here are a few: UK Daily Mail, NBC Bay Area, and NBC News. ***Update*** More stories: Sky News, ABC San Francisco, and more from CNN.
Why not cut the kid a break and have the humanitarians at the State Department find his biological mother and send him home to Somalia?
US State Department should provide airfare to unhappy refugees!
Which reminds me of a reform that is critically needed—any refugee who comes to America, is unhappy and wishes to return to his or her home country or to a camp should be given airfare to go home. We don’t hear of the cases often (they are hushed up!), but some unhappy refugees do scrape together the needed airfare and do return to Africa or the Middle East. We have heard from Iraqis from time to time looking to go back to Iraq.
Maybe take the airfare funds from the resettlement contractor’s cash.