I saw the alert after church on Sunday: a plane had crashed in South Florida, killing all nine people aboard. For a moment, the election forecasts filling the news seemed unimportant beside that loss.
The crash drew attention for a few reasons. It happened just miles from President Trump’s Mar-a-Lago home, and a dashcam recording captured the impact. It was difficult to look away.
Plane crashes tend to hold our attention. Fatal car crashes happen more often, but we think about them differently. A crash in the air can leave passengers and crew aware that death may be close, with no clear way to stop it.
That awareness must be frightening. What would go through your mind? Would you be able to push past the panic and pray?
There’s another question, one that feels personal but is also ethical: Should we listen to a stranger’s final moments? The fact that technology lets us hear someone’s last words doesn’t necessarily mean we have a moral right to hear them.
In Sunday’s crash, the pilot’s final radio communications with air traffic control were recorded and later made public. In them, we can hear the moment the pilot understands the plane cannot be saved. Words spoken in the face of imminent death are now available for anyone to replay.
I don’t think I should listen. Not because it would be unbearable, or because I knew the pilot. And certainly not because I don’t care.
The calls were made to air traffic control, not in private, and investigators have a clear reason to hear them. But that doesn’t answer whether the rest of us should listen simply because we’re curious.
The moments before death are among the most private a person can experience. We’re leaving this world, whether we want to or not. What someone thinks or says then seems to belong to God, and perhaps to their closest family and friends. Turning those words into a clip for strangers to watch feels wrong to me.
I could be mistaken. The public has a legitimate interest in understanding what happened. But do we need to hear a dying person’s final words to understand the crash? Or is that just morbid curiosity?
For me, the tragedy is a reminder of how brief life can be. One day, each of us will leave this life and stand before God. How will you live in the time you have? Are you ready to meet him?
