Ted Huffmire wrote in message ...
Why don't airliners have parachutes for
every passenger? Wouldn't the passengers
of the DC-10 that crashed in Sioux City, IA
have survived if they had been able to jump?
Would the TSA give a passenger hell for
trying to bring his own as a carry on?

If guns are allowed in the cockpit, then
isn't it possible for a dishonest pilot
to hand the gun to someone else past the
security checkpoint at the airport?
Would the TSA have to verify that the gun
made it onto the plane before the aircraft
door is closed?

Ted

Good questions Ted. Some B-52's and tankers had such a bailout chute
in the cockpit. It hurt a lot of people who tried to use it.
They're just too fast to get out. Swept-wing jets are too difficult
to evac in the air when you're talking about hundreds of untrained
passengers. Heck, it's hard to just get them to follow the simple
command: "jump and sit" when the escape slides are deployed on the
ground. A fair percentage always smack their tailbones on the door
seal, break ankles, fall off the slide because they won't sit back.
The winds blows the slides around and makes things worse. A few always
try to use it like a rope because they're scared and that fouls up
everything for those behind them.

In theory, a dishonest cop could come to your house, shoot you, and
phoney up the paperwork to say it was self defense. But at some point
in your life, you're just going to have to trust someone with a gun
not to do that. Besides if a pilot wanted to kill you, he wouldn't
need a gun. Just push the stick over into the ground like that guy
did at JAL (DC-8), or the guy at SilkAir.
Don't worry about pilots with guns.