What do you know about Pashtunwali?

For governments not to make a lot of noise over terrorists incidents that almost but not quite happen is totally normal.  There was a movie about a airplane hijacking about thirty or forty years ago that caused attemped hijackings to increase every time that it was shown in movie theaters nearby.  The name of it excapes me.

There was a movie about a airplane hijacking about thirty or forty years ago that caused attemped hijackings to increase every time that it was shown in movie theaters nearby.

And that's why the "security experts" who say that the increased security in airports is a waste of time and money are wrong.

Yes, al-Qaeda can think of many other places to strike.

Yes, now that we know airplane hijackers can do other things than just fly to Cuba, passengers will be more determined to ensure they will never get control of the aircraft.

But a dramatic event in real life on the order of the attack of September 11, 2001, which by its very nature cannot help but receive vast publicity... runs the risk of inspiring copycat attacks in large numbers.

If your office building is destroyed by an airplane that was crashed into it... by someone upset because his girlfriend left him, instead of an al-Qaeda terrorist... you're still just as dead.

Yes, now that we know airplane hijackers can do other things than just fly to Cuba, passengers will be more determined to ensure they will never get control of the aircraft.

But a dramatic event in real life on the order of the attack of September 11, 2001, which by its very nature cannot help but receive vast publicity... runs the risk of inspiring copycat attacks in large numbers.

I don't think so.

We got copycat hijackings in the old days because it didn't take much. You get on a plane and announce you're hijacking it. Everybody does what you say for awhile because they don't know what you'd do and they're willing to spend aviation fuel and long hours of a few hundred people's lives to avoid problems. Then after it's over either you're in a country that lets you go free or you're in for years and years of legal problems. People who're interested in avoiding years of legal hassle and jailtime won't do it, but people who don't care about that or who don't think ahead might do it.

But now the stakes are higher, so people won't cooperate. Try to hijack a plane and they don't just say "Yessir Mr. Hijacker, what can we do for you in the short run before you get caught?", they try to kill you. You have to stop everybody who tries to kill you, and get into the cabin and kill the pilots, and then pilot the plane yourself from that point on. It's a great big effort with no help from anybody.

If we publicised bank robberies we'd probably get copycat bank robberies. When I looked at the online police records for my town for a couple of months I found a lot of people reporting suspicious guys on the street, and a few auto thefts and such, and two bank robberies. People would go into a bank and demand money, and they'd get maybe a few thousand dollars and leave, and then they'd get caught. You don't need a gun to do a bank robbery, all you need is a piece of paper that says "This is a stickup give me all your money". Maybe people do it as a way to get into jail. It looks pretty easy. If you actually had to have a gun, and you had to shoot a guard, and they had alarm bells and police sirens and people actually shooting at you until you surrendered, I bet it wouldn't happen nearly as much.

Reminds me of a story that I heard about many years ago.  Some clown tried to hijack a Philippines commuter airliner with a knife and made the mistake of stabbing a pregnant flight attendant.  The passengers were so outraged that they overpowered him, took the knife away and threw him off the plane....at about 10 thousand feet.  Ouch. 

Good things do happen, If you wait long enough.  (No, I'm not PC)  Just hope no innocents were hurt at the landing sight.

Yeah, Airport security did such a great job several thousand people died.  Government enforced helplessness is as responsible for their deaths as the terrorists.  The comments in the " Probability Broach" about hijacking were never more apt.

By the way, Air Marshals carry conventional hollow point ammunition.  Nothing rated as safe to aerospace materials.

By the way, Air Marshals carry conventional hollow point ammunition.  Nothing rated as safe to aerospace materials.

True. But hollow point bullets have a tendency to stay in the hijacker rather than pierce the aerospace materials behind him. I presume they're also well-trained, and expected to have good aim.

As for government enforced helplessness, if we didn't have regulations forbidding ordinary people from carrying loaded handguns on planes, this wouldn't guarantee that there would be someone there armed well enough to stop a hijacker. Although banning plastic knives for meals was a bit much.

By the way, Air Marshals carry conventional hollow point ammunition.  Nothing rated as safe to aerospace materials.

True. But hollow point bullets have a tendency to stay in the hijacker rather than pierce the aerospace materials behind him. I presume they're also well-trained, and expected to have good aim.

Your "presumption" is flat-out crap.  Air marshals are no better trained than street cops (both categories are experts in the movies, not in real life -- NYPD releases 41 bullets, gets 9 hits on a guy reaching for a cell phone rather than ducking, for example).  Which means that I am a better shot and I don't claim to be a handgun marksman (though I'm fairly good with a pistol [after three practice shots with a fresh piece I've never missed a target the size of a face at fifty yards with .45 ACP], I'm excellent with a rifle).

In the movies, you make one tiny hole in the aircraft, and the repulsive villian is sucked out the window. In real life, according to a pilot friend of mine, it isn't that horrible an event, and planes have landed safely with a blown-out window.

I like to think that anybody who fires a gun in an aircraft would not attempt a 50-yard shot.

I wonder who the air marshals think they're kidding? They always fly first-class; I never have any trouble spotting the air marshal; he's the burly guy who doesn't belong in first class. 

Arming pilots makes a lot more sense.

While a gun-fight in an airliner does present the danger that an over-penetrating bullet may hit an innocent bystander (good reason to load hollow-points or even glasers), there is practically no danger to the aircraft. Mythbusters demonstrated that even two or three shots fired through a window will not cause the window to blow out resulting in catastrophic decompression. And aircraft engineers tell us that even six or seven bullet holes in the fuselage will not affect cabin pressure significantly.

I wonder who the air marshals think they're kidding? They always fly first-class; I never have any trouble spotting the air marshal; he's the burly guy who doesn't belong in first class. 

Arming pilots makes a lot more sense.

It's been awhile since I've flown on an airliner. One of the last times they were spot-checking passengers and the dice roll came up for my baby, and they held her and looked in her diaper. What with one thing and another it hasn't been worth the trouble going back much.

But the last time I thought the little guy with the sullen face who sat at the very back was probably an air marshal. He wore a vest and a string tie and he looked like he had a bulge under his arm. He looked like he was always pissed off and he made it clear he didn't like me to look at him.

But maybe he wasn't. I'm not sure how to tell who's an air marshal. It didn't seem like they'd think it was my business.

While a gun-fight in an airliner does present the danger that an over-penetrating bullet may hit an innocent bystander (good reason to load hollow-points or even glasers), there is practically no danger to the aircraft. Mythbusters demonstrated that even two or three shots fired through a window will not cause the window to blow out resulting in catastrophic decompression. And aircraft engineers tell us that even six or seven bullet holes in the fuselage will not affect cabin pressure significantly.

  Their was an incident about 6 or 7 years ago I think where a Aloha airlines aircraft landing in Hawaii with an incredible amount of damage to it.  The entire center rear of the aircraft was ripped away, an area about 15 feet long as I remember seeing it.  They only had one person die who was sucked out.  You should be able to find a picture of it on the internet somewhere.

Their was an incident about 6 or 7 years ago I think where a Aloha airlines aircraft landing in Hawaii with an incredible amount of damage to it.  The entire center rear of the aircraft was ripped away, an area about 15 feet long as I remember seeing it.  They only had one person die who was sucked out.  You should be able to find a picture of it on the internet somewhere.

Amazing!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aloha_Airlines_Flight_243

Yea, As a pilot myself, it amazed me too that the captain was actually able to bring it down in one piece.  I'm sure though it was one rough ride for everyone involved.

Aircraft are not hermetically sealed pressure chambers. They leak, constantly, and are continually replenished from outside air. If they didn't, transcontinental passengers would asphyxiate just as if they'd been locked in a refrigerator.

Modern sealed-skin aircraft are pressurized with "bleed air" from the turbine engines, and have "outflow valves" which allow the continuous exchange of air between outside and inside. The outflow valves on a 737/757-class aircraft are about 2 square feet in area when fully opened. The compressors are designed to keep the aircraft fully pressurized at operating altitude, with the outflow valves fully open.

In other words, you could blow out three windows, or a section roughly the area of a carry-on bag, and the plane would lose zero pressure inside.

The idea of a venturi-like effect because of the 500 mph windflow across the skin is also silly: an airplane contains only a limited amount of air, and as soon as the pressure equalizes, there is nothing left to "suck out".

http://www.thegunzone.com/091101/goldfinger.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cabin_pressurization