Posted on 07/10/2002 8:21:43 AM PDT by white trash redneck
I have no doubt that jet planes still remain vulnerable to hijackings and terrorism, especially after recent press reports and information provided to me by a major airline pilot.
Last week, it was revealed that terrorists may be stealing pilot uniforms and identifications, and have been trailing pilots in Europe.
And on March 29 of this year, terrorists may have been testing our airline defenses to undertake another bold attack.
Those who think al-Qaeda is finished with jets are wrong. We know, for example, that a shoe bomber tried to blow up an American Airlines flight.
Past experience also shows that al-Qaeda likes to repeat success. Car bombings are not done just once, they are common practice.
Hijacking a plane, again, and crashing it into a building, again, would be just the type of audacious goal al-Qaeda would love to accomplish.
You might think that would be difficult to do with heightened security. Think again. Our security measures may actually make it easier.
Consider that despite brutal hijackings, the U.S. government still refuses to arm pilots. Despite the pleadings of the pilots, despite the pleading of terrorist experts like Neil Livingstone, the pilots are still unarmed.
Political correctness gone mad has created a major loophole for would-be terrorists. Rather than arm pilots, the U.S. government has said it will a) strengthen cockpit doors and b) put a sky marshal on every flight.
But everyone knows that every flight does not have a sky marshal, and with 100,000 marshals needed to cover every U.S. flight, this will be a most difficult challenge.
Consider for a moment if one or more terrorists, perhaps with the help of Fifth Columnist airport workers, smuggles one or more guns onto a plane.
To secure complete control of the jet, all the terrorist needs to do is gain access to the cockpit and kill the pilots. Once in the cockpit, the terrorist simply secures the cockpit door. The hijacker will be safely ensconced in the secure cockpit.
A terrified group of passengers would be powerless behind the now secure cockpit doors.
How does a terrorist with a gun gain access to the cockpit?
As anyone who has flown first class or business class since 9-11 knows, pilots continue to leave the cockpits to go to the bathroom or to communicate with crew.
If an armed terrorist sitting in first class seizes the moment, he could easily kill the exiting pilot, enter the cockpit, kill the remaining pilot, and simply lock the door to the cockpit.
Sound far-fetched?
In April I received an e-mail from a pilot for one of the top three airlines. It confirmed my worries.
The pilot wrote: "I am a pilot for [name not revealed] Airlines. And I have information about a flight that took place on Friday, March 29. This flight probably had terrorists on board who were testing our defenses against them and were riding around the system checking out other airlines' responses to their presence."
The pilot gave me his phone number and we chatted.
He said he was not on any of the flights in question, but that his buddy was a co-pilot on one leg flown by possible terrorists.
The pilot told me that on March 29, two Arab men flew from London to Newark after purchasing first-class tickets with cash. The pair then flew to a south Florida city.
Leaving Florida from still another city, they flew to New York and then back to France.
The pilot said that the men had several passports and didn't bother to pack luggage. The crew in Newark were apparently so worried they didn't want to leave the terminal, but security there said there was no evidence the men were terrorists and they had to be allowed to fly.
The pilot said that during the flight from Newark to Florida, one of the Arab men did something very suspicious.
He said that when the cockpit door opened as a pilot exited, one of the men abruptly stood up.
The passenger's abrupt movement caught the attention of the attendant, who quickly asked the man what he was doing. The man's tense disposition quickly dissipated as he said he was just getting up to use the lavatory.
As we know, nothing happened that day. But it may have been a test and a warning.
More pause for us to ask why the pilots are still not armed.
bttt
I’d like the pilots or the unions that represent them to explain why, if their being armed would “provide the strongest possible deterrent to terrorists that would contemplate September 11th style attacks by denying them cockpit access, and thus control of the airliner” (quote taken from the APSA website), the program would be voluntary.
Do they not want to provide that “strongest possible deterrent” to all flights?
Assuming that they insist on the voluntary program, are they open to the idea of letting passengers know in advance which flights will have armed pilots so the passenger can choose whether they are on a flight with the strongest possible deterrent?
I’ve got other questions for them too, but I’ll stop there for now.
By the way, EL Al pilots NEVER come out of the cockpit, even on 12 hour flights from LAX to Tel Aviv. How they manage this technically I do not know.
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