Trevor Jacob
Youtuber intentionally caused the plane to crash – now he has to be imprisoned for it
Staged to generate clicks: The YouTuber Trevor Jacob jumps out of his plane after an apparent engine failure and has pre-installed cameras film him
© Screenshot Youtube video Trevor Jacob
Youtuber Trevor Jacob crashed a plane and filmed the supposed emergency. Now a court has determined: The crash was staged – and the YouTuber has to go to prison.
Because he intentionally crashed his plane in a national park to get a high number of clicks, a YouTuber from the USA has to go to prison for six months. As the US authorities announced on Monday, the prison sentence for Trevor Jacob arrested in an out-of-court settlement. He was originally threatened with up to 20 years in prison.
Jacob had published a spectacular video of the crash and its consequences on the Internet platform YouTube; it has been viewed more than three million times. According to the US authorities’ findings, he specifically staged the accident that occurred in Southern California in November 2021 and then hindered the investigation.
Trevor Jacob jumped out of a plane with a parachute
Filming himself using a selfie stick, Jacob, now 30 years old, jumped from the crashing plane with a parachute over dense vegetation in Los Padres National Park in November 2021. Cameras mounted all over the aircraft captured the descent of the out-of-control single-engine plane and its crash.
Jacob’s viewers were also able to watch as the pilot climbed to the wreckage of his plane after the crash and was apparently disappointed to discover that the water supplies he had packed were no longer there. Jacob showed how he wandered through forests and over hills looking for help, repeatedly talking about how thirsty he was and how helpless he felt.
When he finally stopped at a water source, a vehicle came along in the staged footage and rescued the pilot in time before nightfall.
Youtuber recovered plane from US national park
The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) opened an investigation into the crash and ordered Jacob not to dispose of the plane’s wreckage because of possible investigations. The pilot told authorities he didn’t know where the wreckage was, but according to a lawsuit filed in Los Angeles, he and a friend recovered the wreckage from the forest in a helicopter two weeks after the crash. He had previously backed up data from the cameras on board.
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According to the investigation, in the coming days, contrary to official orders, Jacob cut his plane into small pieces and disposed of them in garbage cans in and around the Lompoc City Airport. He later admitted that he wanted to obstruct federal authorities in their investigation and had previously lied when reporting an aviation accident. The FAA revoked his pilot’s license in April.
Plane crash staged for YouTube
Jacob apparently made some mistakes in staging the crash. A number of pilots and aviation experts pointed out that the YouTuber did not take even the simplest steps to restart the engine of the crash-prone plane. Others noted that Jacob could have made a safe landing while gliding. It is also extremely unusual for a pilot in a small aircraft to carry a parachute on his back just in case of emergency.
According to prosecutors’ findings, Jacob staged the crash “most likely to generate social media and news coverage for himself and to derive financial benefit from it.” “Nevertheless, this type of ‘daredevil’ behavior cannot be tolerated,” the prosecutor stressed.