from as msnbc world headquarters, welcome to alex witt reports. we begin with breaking news as we await a news conference from police in mississippi where a pilot is now in custody after threatening to crash his plane into a walmart. he circled the skies for hours and instead landed in a field in north mississippi. the faa says only the pilot was on board, no word yet confirming his identity. it started early today after the pilot took off from to pull a regional airport. the police got word that the pilot intended to crash intentionally, the walmart was closed. that plane flew haphazardly for hours before coming down in the field where police swarmed it and made the arrest. here s our affiliate as that drama unfolded. we have been able to confirm, we have at least confirmed to us that it has crashed, that does not mean they reach the crash location. one of the difficult things about figuring out something like that is just how fast the plane was moving. at its lowest poi
aircraft and took off from the tupelo airport. we do know that pattison does have some flight instruction. we don t believe he s in a licensed pilot. it s ongoing to discover that. he s employed he has access to these aircraft. he is a lineman for tupelo aviation, which means he fuels the aircraft. we know that the aircraft was fully fueled the night before. at approximately 5:23 am patterson, from the aircraft called county 9-1-1 to tell them that he was going to crash the aircraft in the main walmart in tupelo, mississippi. soon thereafter, tupelo police department and fire department evacuated the walmart, and all the surrounding areas. we were assisted by the county s o. numerous major streets were