"Emmanuel Gustin" wrote...

Probably not. I would be more worried about bullets striking
cabling and causing short-circuits.

They're all protected by circuit breakers. Any fire would be short lived.


The vast majority of hijacks have not ended in crashes, but in
safe landings, and were resolved on the ground by negotiation
if possible, and in the worst case by security forces storming
the plane.

Sorry, but the past is no indicator of the future in this case. The events of
9-11 have proven beyond ANY doubt that NO airborne hijacker can be allowed into
ANY cockpit for ANY reason EVER AGAIN! There is NO reason to believe ANY
hijacker will have ANY purpose but similar acts of mass destruction!


The presence of sky marshalls can have a certain deterrent
effect, but I doubt their effectiveness in a real incident.

They have already proven effective in several incidents.


Considering the layout of most large airliners, it would be
difficult enough for the officer to remain aware of what is
happening (the pilot can signal that there is an attempt to take
control of the aircraft, but probably little else)

If a sky marshall is so "out of it" that he is not aware that a hijacker has
passed him and is at the cockpit door, attempting entry, he is probably already
dead. In that case, the pilots DO have options to try to prevent entry. If
those fail, their weapons may be the only alternative.


It's sound like a promising theoretical concept, but I think the
money and resources would be far better spent on measures
to prevent terrorists getting on board.

So far, all of them have failed.


It is, as far as I know, only one week. Far too little to deal
with a complex and psychologically very demanding situation,
in which pilots would be dealing with pressure exerted on them
from the other side of a closed door, while the terrorists hold
the passengers hostage. The notion that the pilots could defend
the cockpit as a kind of fortress seems far too simplistic to me.

Well, I guess you aren't an airline pilot, then...