Came up with this in an idle moment on a transatlantic flight last weekend.
If someone took out a knife and threatened stewards or pilots, the simplest thing to do would be to advise all passengers to strap themselves in tight, and then knock the external doors out. The pressure differential would simply suck the bad guys out the door.
Of course, it would be total mayhem, as everything else that wasn’t strapped down would get sucked out too, and you might also lose innocent people. But to cause mischief on a plane, you’d pretty much have to be mobile and not strapped in, so it would mainly target the right people. Also, because the oxygen masks are above seats, people standing up would have to get to a seat, quick.
Once the pressure had equalised, an air marshall/air steward/copilot with a portable oxygen supply could then proceed thru the plane with stun gun/pepper spray/restraints, incapacitating any remaining terrorist/s.
I’m thinking that maybe the pilots would have to have their own oxygen supply (hermetically sealed cockpit?).
Does this idea suck, or could it be used in extremis?
Don’t airline doors open towards the inside, making them impossible to be opened while airborne? I seem to recall the phrase “4 tonnes of force required” from somewhere.
Yes, I realise that, but I guess I’m thinking the difference between the tragic loss of one or two innocents, versus the horror of losing the whole plane and whatever it crashes into.
I thought the doors opened outwards. The emergency exits do, don’t they?
Well if you’re willing to accept a few deaths and you did say “knife” then I think the current situation is grand.
If I’m on a plane and somebody/a group takes a knife/s out and tries to take the plane. I like ~100% of the rest of the passengers are going to assume that the plane is going to be flown into something. In which case you’ve no option but to fight like what most probably happened on one of the planes on Sept. 11th. This time the response would be quicker and hopefully less tragic.
The shoe bomb incident showed that people will be proactive in these situations.
Plane doors open to the outside, but -IIRC- you have to push them into the wind, so to speak. Look at an airplane door when you board: if you board the plane from the left, the door will open toward the left (i.e. the front).
Kinda hard at a cruising speed of 900 km/h, I reckon.
For this idea to work as planned, the pilot would first have to put the plane into a deep dive, to get to a lower altitude; otherwise, the pressure difference would suck out the seats as well, with all of the passengers.
(A well-known example of this is what happened to the de Havilland Comet, a jet airliner of the early 1950s: the cabin cracked open in midflight due to metal fatigue, and the sudden depressurization ripped out the contents of the cabin, seats and all. There’s a good description of this here, as well as in the book Turbulent Skies by my father, T.A. Heppenheimer.)
Given the amount of time it would take to do that safely - commercial aircraft aren’t stunt planes, after all - it would be faster and safer to subdue the terrorists by more normal means, as yojimbo notes.
on an Airbus the Doors fold inwards slightly, before being pushed outwards and to the left.
The drummer in my band (and ex steward) was standing in the doorway after a flight, waiting for the cleaning crew to knock on the door so that he could open it for them (rather than them flicking the outside handle). one of the crew opened the door from the outside and the door folded down slightly, onto the drummers head, and damaging his neck.
I really do like the idea of would-be terrorists getting sucked out of a plane and plummeting several thousand feet to their deaths-- I really do. But as RedNaxela mentioned, unless the pilot perfomed some pretty dramatic aerial stunts (big planes don’t do such things that well) prior to whoever hitting the big red push-in-case-of-guy-with-knife button, its quite likely that explosive decompression would lead to the death of innocent passengers. Also, even if all the passengers were strapped-in and the seats didn’t get sucked out, you would have to deal with things like heart conditions and structural damage to the aircraft. While this would produce additional work for mechanic’s unions (a good thing?) it would also probably drive the cost of air travel even higher (a bad thing). While I can’t say that this idea is feasible, it would make a good climax in a Schwarzeneggar (there’s no way I spelled that correctly) film.
I propose a fanciful idea along the lines of Sandra Bullock vehicle “Demolition Man.” Remember the scene where Sly’s car crashes but he is saved by instantly hardening foam only to utter something prolific like “My car turned into a canoli!” Put that foam on the plane. I know, I know… won’t people suffocate? Well, its future foam that doesn’t suffocate people of course!
Well I guess it’s a sucky idea all round. Shouldn’t base my speculation on the movies…
Back to the drawing board - how about opaque smoke bombs to fill the cabin until the pilot can make an emergency landing (hermetically sealed cockpit necessary here)? Of course blind terrorists would then be at a distinct advantage…
I am thinking of putting someone on every plane who can fart at will.
And feed them 8 pints of Guinness and a Chicken Donner before every flight.
in event of emergency, said person can flood the cabin with noxious fumes, rendering life unbearable, let alone breathing, and therefore all would be terrorists would be unable to hijack plane.
My modest proposal since 9/11 has been: Get rid of the cockpit door!
Naturally it wouldn’t be quite that easy, as it wouldn’t be feasible to retrofit exterior cockpit access into many models of plane that don’t have it. A basic bathroom and food locker would have to be incorporated into the cockpit. It would also complicate crew changes on the ground, requiring extra or wider mouthed jetways, exterior stairs, or other alternatives.
But my basic premise is that there’s no real need for access to/from the cockpit in flight. Communication with the cockpit could be conducted via intercom/phone. I can’t recall any real world examples of The High and The Mighty/Airplane!-style passengers-have-to-land-the-plane incidents in history. The idea of the Captain or a member of the flight crew intervening personally in passenger disputes or disturbances is, I think, ridiculous even aside from terrorist threats… he/she is a pilot, not a high school principal. The senior flight attendant should be the ultimate authority in such matters.
“Hijackings” would still be possible on a “doorless” plane via the taking of passenger/flight attendant hostages, but actual control of the plane could never be relinquished, and the plane’s vulnerability to bomb or other attacks causing loss of cabin pressure would be somewhat reduced as well.
At the very least, the next generation of airliners could incorporate this feature, though I envision resistance from the airlines on the grounds of the seat or two it would cost them to provide the extra bathroom/food storage. Alas, I’ve yet to hear the proposal made publicly.
Seriously though, Umbriel, could your proposal not be made more feasible by lockable cockpit doors combined with CCTV of the cabin? Or is the idea that the pilots shouldn’t be allowed even the potential to enter the cabin - thus to avoid emotional pressure by the taking and threatening of hostages?
Stronger doors (they’re already lockable, but relatively flimsy) are certainly an improvement. The focus of my idea, though, is to make it impossible for a hijacker to either force his way into the cockpit or to negotiate his way into direct control of the plane.
Even a strong door might be forced by determined hijackers, and would certainly be vulnerable to some sort of ambush by attackers charging during a bathroom break or meal when the door isn’t secure. Hijackers can also demand access to a locked cockpit, torturing or killing passengers until their demands are met. An armed flight crew, while less vulnerable to direct assault, might even be more vulnerable to coercion via hostages, in that they would be more likely to open their door if they felt capable of and responsible for counterattacking to save their passengers.
jjimm, it is my understanding that some pilots have made plans to do something similar–but instead of making announcements and blowing out doors, they will simply put the plane through severe maneuvers–whatever they can do without losing control of the plane. Everyone and everything not strapped down is going to be slammed against the ceiling. It will render the would-be hijackers at least temporarily helpless, and might even injure them.
Keep your seatbelt on during the flight. They’re not going to tip them off by telling everyone to strap in.
This is third-hand info; take it with a grain of salt.
Even if you put a small galley, toilet et all in the cockpit (there is no room) a Pilot/captain is still commanding his “vessel”. He/she is going to want access to his “ship” for whatever reason. There are also times when there are genuine emergencies that may require access to the cockpit from the outside. They are also the “authority” figures in the aircraft (unless a sky marshall happened to be on board) that is sometimes required to have a “presence” on board.
I remember one in particular that an off duty pilot that was just a regular passenger helped control the airplane that crashed at Sioux City. If it wasn’t for him up there almost certainly all souls would have been lost. Its the instances we can’t think of that would make it important.
I think that armed pilots with a very secure cockpit door is the way to go. I also like the idea of Sky Marshalls.
