"John R Weiss" wrote:

"Gord Beaman" wrote...

I'm also slightly against arming pilots because to endanger these
'Most Essential to Flight" units (pilots) in -any- way isn't
smart...we should put all effort into keeping miscreants out of
the cockpit.

Good in theory, but not necessarily foolproof in reality.


I just can't believe that a secure double door
system coupled with an iron clad -procedure- is that hard to
design or that expensive.

The double door idea is obviously practicable, or else El Al wouldn't have them.
OTOH, US airlines are so driven by short-term profits and artificially low
ticket prices due to "competition" that none of them is willing to be first to
implement the "safest" measures.

Just as nobody could believe 9-11 could happen even once, nobody is willing to
admit it could happen again. Until then, we'll be saddled with partial
solutions.


Just imagine the cost to an airline of
one successful hijack, not just for the hardware, more than
likely that'd be mostly covered by insurance but imagine the cost
in missed revenue due to public apprehension.

So, if armed pilots thwart only ONE hijacking...

Quite true BUT. I worry about endangering those 'essential to
flight units'. Think of the ever present danger of a loaded
pistol in the comparatively small confines of an airliner cockpit
for years and years, while a steel door (or two) is fairly
innocuous. Also, as a matter of curiosity, what would you expect
to happen if a 9MM or so slug were to go through one of the
windscreens?. Aren't most glass and plastic laminated? (NESA?)

We hit three seagulls just at rotate with a C-119 once and it
caused somewhat of a kerfluffle for awhile. Smashed out the
pilot's windscreen, cockpit was filled with flying pieces of
glass and plexiglass, gull-guts, gull-feathers, gull-****,
gull-bits, gull-drumsticks and other bits and sods.

Also the biggest, most sudden freaking windblast full of dust and
flotsam from years of use. Pilot had a weak stomach and he added
to the fun by barfing into that windblast and distributing his
half digested dinner to us. Cojo did a good job of getting us
around an abbreviated circuit and on the deck...

That friggin a/c stank for a couple of years after that...gull
guts are nasty.
--

-Gord.