At 04:28 PM 10/31/2002 -0800, Bill Frantz wrote:
At 1:52 PM -0800 10/31/02, Steve Schear wrote:
At 11:37 AM 10/31/2002 -0800, you wrote:
Another "fix" that is being used is passengers who will act to keep the plane from being used as a weapon. If the hijackers have to kill people with small sharp objects that they can smuggle on board, instead of mass killing devices like machine guns, then a large number of passengers can overcome a small number of hijackers.
This assumption may not be a good one. Considering the level of current security checks, it should be trivial to smuggle some sort of anesthetic or poisonous gas generator aboard. No need for sharp objects. AFAIK, the air supply aboard current U.S. fleets is shared between passengers and cockpit.
IIRC, the regs call for pilots to either wear oxygen masks, or have "quick to put on" masks readily at hand.
Unfortunately, there are many gasses which kill or disable with only a small dosage (e.g., VX). Unless the cabins are equipped with toxic air sensors (possible in a few years with all the biochip work underway) I think the masks may be be too little too late. steve