A closer look

Thomas Fitzpatrick stole a single-engine plane from a New Jersey flight school in 1956 and landed it perfectly on a narrow Manhattan street right in front of a bar where he had been drinking. Two years later, after a tavern patron refused to believe his incredible story about the aeronautical stunt, Fitzpatrick got drunk again, stole another plane from the exact same airfield, and landed it on another New York street just to prove his point. The sheer chaotic energy of commuting into one of the world's most densely populated cities via stolen aircraft because you lost an alcohol-fueled argument is both terrifying and deeply impressive. It remains a golden testament to mid-century aviation security, an era where preventing a guy from grand-theft-aeroing a plane twice seemingly involved little more than a stern warning and asking him nicely not to do it a third time