Posted on 09/28/2001 9:17:37 AM PDT by Search4Truth
I believe there is an issue also as to what should be done with the firearm when a pilot is hitching a ride.
I think a firearm in the cockpit should be viewed as a last option.
4 or 5 terrorists randomly seated on plane. Terrorist closest to front stands, grabs a flight attendant and, holding a large plastic blade he’d sewn into his clothing to her throat, announces he’s hijacking the aircraft. LONE sky marshal, weapon drawn, declares himself, and commands terrorist to release hostage and assume the position. During take down and marshal’s attention focused on first terrorist, terrorists behind marshal swarm and subdue him – and take his weapon! Unless the OTHER passengers come to his aid and take down the bad guys, the terrorists now have the only weapon on the aircraft and are now in command.
IT’S A NO-BRAINER, MR. BUSH: WITHOUT A GUN ON THE FLIGHT DECK, THE PLANE WILL EITHER BECOME A GUIDED MISSLE or BE SHOT DOWN BY THE UNITED STATES AIR FORCE – PER YOUR ORDERS.
I AND MY LOVED ONES ARE SURE AS HELL NOT GETTING BACK ON A COMMERCIAL AIRCRAFT UNTIL THE GUYS UP FRONT HAVE SOME MEANS TO KEEP US ALL ALIVE.
AND THEY ALREADY HAVE! Title 14 CFR 108.11 already authorizes airline pilots to carry firearms.
Check it out yourself by punching “14CFR 108.11” into any decent search engine.
Meanwhile, the Airline Pilots Association is petitioning Congress to pass a law allowing them to carry firearms in the cockpit. Doesn’t this association have lawyers, and don’t these lawyers ever check the law books? It’s already there! Here’s a piece:
Sec. 108.11 Carriage of weapons. (a) No certificate holder required to conduct screening under a security program may permit any person to have, ...on or about his or her person or property, a deadly or dangerous weapon, either concealed or unconcealed, accessible to him or her while aboard an airplane for which screening is required unless:
(1) The person having the weapon is-- (i) An official or employee of the United States (Why are they so !@#$% special?) or ... (ii) Authorized to have the weapon by the certificate holder and the Administrator and has successfully completed a course of training in the use of firearms acceptable to the Administrator.
A friend who is a Delta 767 Captain phoned to inform me of this. Pull up the whole statute and read it closely. I asked him about the "certificate holder."
"That’s the airline," he barked. "They have the authority to put a gun in anyone’s hands, according to the law already on the books."
He’s right. That "person" referred to is not restricted to pilots. They way I read it, the airline can authorize anyone to carry a weapon anytime, and that means you and me. It is strictly up to them. The bozos could have made the flights a lot safer a long time ago by simply utilizing this statute with prudence.
I don't buy this. Americans are overwhelmingly for Pilots being armed. Where is the political risk, if in fact President Bush is serving Americans. Who would dare object, accept Bush.
On the otherhand, John Lott says it could take up to 35,000 air marshalls to have a marshall on each domestic flight. That's going to be awfully expensive. Sounds to me like that's the basis for letters to congress critters and the President endorsing John Lott's proposals. And maybe a letter to the Airline Pilots Association, saying you'd look favorably on their striking if they aren't allowed to be armed voluntarily.
The argument that pilots should concentrate on flying the plane rather being police is specious. The purpose of having pilots armed is to insure that they remain pilots, not to make them air marshalls. If the pilots of the planes hijacked on the 11th had guns, they would have remained pilots instead of dead on the floor or tied up in the back.
Explosive decompression, except in a few rare cases, is a Hollywood myth.
I maintained cockpit pressurization systems in the Navy. Here's how they work. Air is bled off of the engines, cooled and pumped into the cabin. A valve between the cabin and the outside bleeds off excess pressure, keeping the cabin at a comfortable pressure. The valve is about 2 feet across. At cruising speed, the engines provide enough pressure to require that the pressure valve is about 25% open. That's about the size of a coffee cup. A bullet through the skin of an airplane would require the pressure valve to close a little more. Your ears might pop in the time between the hole opened and the valve compensated, but that's all. No wind in the cockpit, no papers flying about, no people being pulled out of their seats.
Explosive decompression CAN occur, but it requires that a large surface area be suddenly removed, like a canopy coming off, or a three foot section of skin suddenly ripping loose. In that case, being sucked out by the slipstream is the biggest danger.
The reason that Safety Slugs are preferred on airplanes is that any hole in the skin has to be fixed and that causes downtime and lost revenue for the airline. It's not a safety issue.
Knitebane
Should that option come before or after shooting down hijacked commercial airliners?
.....he MUST allow us to protect ourselves.
Now just where in the heck did you get this idea from??
We have The POLICE to do protect us, even though the Supreme Court has said that the police do Not have to protect you one itsy bitty bit.
Since 1934 the American people and their less than illustrious representatives have gone along with more and more ursurptions of the Second Admendment and why should they suddenly wake up and cry about their rights being gone now.
Rallying Cry of the 21st Century......
You may not agree but you and I are outnumbered.
CATO
I suppose 7,000 dead Americans was not the wakeup call I thought it was. (Sigh)
I can't agree. If the hijackers' objective is to crash the plane into high value targets the chance of failure is too high at this time. For one thing, the passengers now understand the new rules of engagement and won't be passive. They'll react before it becomes necessary to be dead heroes. I think the more rational terrorists know this and won't throw away their lives on failed passenger jet missions -for now.
Instead of agonizing, I'd like to see my fellow Americans reject their own suicidal pacifism and adjust to the reality that we are in a fight to the death with anarchists armed with a cosmic rational. We either decide we deserve to live more than they do or we have already lost. Why? Because they like to kill. They particularly like to kill non-combatants. To survive we will have to be more ruthless than they are.
Couldn't agree more. However, arming pilots would seem to be a simple step to restore both Americans' trust in the Federal government (Bush adminsitration) and the safety of the airlines. To my mind, this is a critical issue in many ways - safety and trust to name a couple.
I think we would be much better off with armed marshalls on the plane who can do the security and let the pilots be pilots.
I’d be more comfortable if their were only armed Sky Marshals but, even that opens doors to abuse, doesn’t it?
It’s a damn difficult issue.
Does the same logic apply to other jobs? What about bank security guards" or Secret Service officers? Should they be allowed to keep their jobs if they refuse to carry?
My argument against undercover sky marshalls is: How are the crew going to know who is a undercover sky marshall and who is anb undercover suicide bomber?
Let's say that a hijacker has a gun on board and is spotted by one of the crew. Should they feel safe? What if said hijacker pulls out official (fake) Air Marshall ID and presents it to the crew and says that they need to talk to the pilot because they saw something out of the ordinary in Row 3? And then proceeds to pop the unarmed pilot. And drive it into the Sears Tower. Couldn't happen? Why not?
The pilots should be forced to carry and they should be the only ones to carry. They should also be locked in the cockpit for the duration of the flight. Problem solved.
Or an ever bigger threat IMHO, hijackers impersonating air marshalls. They are undercover and the crew doesn't know who they are. What does a crew person do if they see an armed passenger? Assume they are air marshalls? What if they aren't?
The last line of the defense is the cockpit and its defenders are the pilots. Why are they not armed? How are we safer that they are not? Why are we not taking this simple precaution?
Why is President Bush opposing the arming of pilots. We are getting a lot of interesting alternatives, but why not the most obvious, simplest and cost effective solution. We are willing to consider shooting down hijacked commercial airliners, but pilots with handguns, out of the question. Where are all the 2nd Amendment folks on this issue? Or does President Bush get a pass on the 2ND Amendment?
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