FAA finalizes rule for secondary cockpit barriers on new passenger planes

22 years later? Is it any wonder when I get a letter from the FAA for my SIA it looks like it was written using a 1950's typewriter? They move at the speed of stink!

I believe that even having an impenetrable cockpit door is questionable. Every potential safety improvement is normally subjected to analysis of the tradeoffs involved. But not breaching the cockpit door, because terrorism causes people to become irrational. Since the impenetrable cockpit door has been implemented there have been two (possibly three considering the recent China Airlines crash) commercial pilot murder-suicides where the other pilot has desperately tried to get in to save the plane but couldn't. The obvious benefit is that terrorist/lunatics cannot get in to try and crash the plane. I believe that after 9/11 everybody has evolved their thinking so that passengers will always try to overpower terrorists on a plane, thus that threat is reduced considerably. Actually, that evolution actually happened *on* 9/11 as the passengers on that last plane realized what had happened with the 3 previous planes and went after the terrorists with everything they had. Now since Germanwings there's a two-person-in-the-cockpit rule so perhaps the tradeoff has swung back in favor of an unbreachable cockpit door again. However, in my mind, I see a suicidal pilot planning for the time when the co-pilot gets up and leaves to go to the bathroom while a flight attendant or 3rd pilot starts to enter the cockpit, and during the exchange the suicidal pilot catches them both by surprise and pushes them both out and locks the door.

Prior to 911, protocol was to negotiate with terrorists and usually that worked out. After 911, when faced with terrorists crashing the plane, most if not all passengers will fight back.

I suppose it is good to have it, but it is sad that we need it.

Cheaper to put an air Marshall in the jump seat. He goes out first and stops all entry to the forward galley/washroom area., or hell just give the in-flight service manager a taser!

If we look back at the first 747s, many were equipped with a crew lav and bunk area that was separate from the pax, although maybe not a bullet proof door, but an easy design that would allow 1) cockpit crew to eat, sleep, lav all without bothering anyone including ludicrous Flight Attendant cart barriers, provide for FA lav such that they are not waiting in line when they have more important things to do, serve as the cockpit secondary barrier.

You might lose one row of revenue seats, but it would simplify a lot of things

This appears to be a solution in search of a problem.

This seems to be an insanely expensive requirement for a problem that has not existed since 9/11.

Next, they'll require an isolated lavatory for the flight crew and a little, interlocked pass-through for food and drinks.

That will be followed by crew rest areas also isolated from any passenger access. The first twenty foot of an airliner will be strictly for the flight crew and their safety. Of course, it will also be required for any foreign carrier coming into US airspace with the cost added to passenger fares around the world.

My suggestion would be much cheaper over the life of the aircraft, including construction costs.... Place a couple ex-special forces guys fore and aft in the cabin armed with an MP5 and a Glock 19.

You won't even need air marshals whom have proven to be idiots like the one who recently showed off his firearm to a flight attendant prompting an emergency declaration and return to origin.

"The pilot union ALPA (Air Line Pilots Association) supports the rule, calling the requirement "long overdue"", they said while looking for a way to make money from it.

Look at it this way, the more added weight they put in the aircraft makes for fewer passengers they can carry which means a little more breathing room. Hell, at some point they may actually have to remove one whole seat from planes and then maybe two. Good times.

Just curious, flight crews know when they have a doctor onboard I believe. Do flight crews know when there is an air marshal onboard?

I've been receiving weekly mails for longer than I care to remember. I've made some comments, upvoted some comments and downvoted some comments. But I'm going to post a phrase here now that is very relevant that I use on a social media platform: Tell me you're American without telling me you're American.

8 billion people on this flat Earth </s>. 7.7 billion are not Americans. I despair. No wonder America is the most hated country on the planet.

Downvote this all you like. Make any comment you like. I won't see it because I'm unsubscribing from the weekly newsletter. I'm sitting watching the grass growing with one eye and watching the paint dry with the other.

What a pointless exercise. Have there been any flight deck compromises since 9/11?

In addition to the current hardening, passengers are now pre-screened, ID's are checked, random sky marshals, very stringent scanning technologies and restrictions regarding what can be taken in carryon. Additionally, passengers are far more likely to intervene. Who knows what other less visible measures exist.

There comes a point of diminishing returns to prevent a plane being controlled.

I know we can address “the thing” that's in front of us, and addressing it addresses “that thing” and everything that comes after it, but how come nobody is talking about (the elephant in the room which is) what were those things that came EEFORE “the thing,” which caused us to have to address “the thing” in the first place?

• The breakdown of “not breaching the cockpit”
• The mental health of those breaching the cockpit
• The cultural standards in place that are being overlooked that contribute to more and more angry people who don't have mental awareness nor psychological tools to address their unstable mental states

It's hard to explain, and hard to grasp if you're trying to read this and grasp the point I'm trying to make, but difficulty in crafting its expression is not a reason to abandon trying to explain it and manifest its explanation.

It is about time. What are they thinking up there?

Back when it was just men piloting the aircraft, they could have just issued box lunches to the cockpit crew and water bottles to piss in like the good old days as a fighter jock. Give 'em their supplies and seal the door.

P.S. For those of you without a sense of humor, it's a joke.

That is going to be interesting...

How about a cockpit that has no interior entrance at all that the pilots from the outside enter through a trap door at the top..

A little late