# Could you break into your house? **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [May 17, 2023, 12:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-you-break-into-your-house/984159 "2023-05-17T12:05:14Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 15\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![enipla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/54ee81/32.png) [@enipla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/enipla)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2023, 11:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-you-break-into-your-house/984159/101 "2023-05-21T11:40:35Z")
> [@pullin](#): > > Upset because I cooperated with police, he promised to return to my house and finish what he started. Very scary pullin. ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2023, 2:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-you-break-into-your-house/984159/102 "2023-05-21T14:52:41Z")
Yeah, if you can’t move away and disappear, that’s got to be the best choice. When people tell me they keep a gun at home “for protection” i always wonder if they’ve considered better locks on stronger doors. ---
**Author:** ![Gatopescado](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gatopescado/32/5711_2.png) [@Gatopescado](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gatopescado)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2023, 6:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-you-break-into-your-house/984159/103 "2023-05-21T18:33:47Z")
I could, but nothing worth stealing in here. ---
**Author:** ![chela](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chela/32/21582_2.png) [@chela](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/chela)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2023, 9:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-you-break-into-your-house/984159/104 "2023-05-30T21:53:19Z")
Saw this, who locked out the pilot? > **[Southwest pilot climbs through cockpit window to unlock plane just before flight](https://www.cbsnews.com/news/southwest-pilot-climb-cockpit-window-unlock-plane-before-flight/)** > > The carrier says a passenger had somehow accidentally locked the plane and that meant the pilot had to use an alternate route onto the aircraft. ---
**Author:** ![DCnDC](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dcndc/32/2842_2.png) [@DCnDC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DCnDC)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2023, 10:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-you-break-into-your-house/984159/105 "2023-05-30T22:00:55Z")
The 737 doesn’t have an “Executive Decision” hatch? ---
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2023, 7:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-you-break-into-your-house/984159/106 "2023-05-31T07:17:45Z")
> [@chela](#): > > [Southwest pilot climbs through cockpit window to unlock plane just before flight - CBS News](https://www.cbsnews.com/news/southwest-pilot-climb-cockpit-window-unlock-plane-before-flight/) How the hell was a passenger alone on a plane? There have to be procedures in place to prevent something like that. ---
**Author:** ![enipla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/54ee81/32.png) [@enipla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/enipla)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2023, 11:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-you-break-into-your-house/984159/107 "2023-05-31T11:09:32Z")
Cockpit windows on a 737 open? And you can do it from the outside? ---
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2023, 11:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-you-break-into-your-house/984159/108 "2023-05-31T11:24:58Z")
All things being equal, I’d rather they be openable from the outside than from the inside. The former is much less likely to occur mid-flight. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2023, 3:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-you-break-into-your-house/984159/109 "2023-05-31T15:10:55Z")
> [@Alessan](#): > > How the hell was a passenger alone on a plane? There have to be procedures in place to prevent something like that. Piecing together the puzzle … The passenger was _probably_ not alone on the plane. All the FAs were _probably_ all still on board which is required by FAA until the last passenger has left the jet. (They’re also required to herd the last passengers up the jetbridge to the terminal building and ensure the one-way building door locks behind them with no passengers on the jet or on the bridge.) The pilots had left the cockpit while deboarding was still in progress. Very normal. Their mistake was they left the cockpit door lock, which is electrical, armed. Oops. The procedure is to disarm the latch (flip the appropriate toggle switch to “off”), then open the door and exit. This switch, of course, is inside the cockpit. One of the last passengers getting off decides to use the lav right behind the cockpit. Also very normal. In the course of opening the lav door the cockpit door swings shut. Also completely normal; happens 10 times during every boarding and a couple times during most deboardings. On 737s the two hinge lines are adjacent and both doors swing through the same 90 degree arc occupying the very same space. As the cockpit door swings shut, the electric latch engages. The passenger has no clue what they’ve done, nor do any of the FA’s immediately notice anything unusual. It looks normal, and except for a slightly different noise as the door shuts there’s nothing to see from the outside. But the trap has been sprung. Eventually the passenger finishes in the lav, opens the lav door, steps out, and continues into the jetbridge and terminal. Eventually to be followed by the FAs if they’re leaving this jet, or not if they’re staying aboard for the next flight. One of the last things FA’s do before departing the jet is walk the entire cabin looking for people hiding, or collapsed on the floor, or still in the lavs. They’re also looking for forgotten books, suitcases, purses, tablets, infants, emotional support harpies, etc. Did the FA’s on that flight do a less than perfect job on that flight and leave somebody in the forward lav? Maybe; I can’t tell from the fragmentary reporting. But that mistake is certainly _not_ a necessary condition for the cockpit door becoming inadvertently locked by a passenger after the pilots goof and leave the door lock armed. Umpteen minutes later the new pilots arrive (or the old ones return) to be faced with a deadbolted cockpit door. Damn. All 4 of the normal entry & galley doors can be opened from the outside. As can the 2 or 4 overwing emergency exit hatches. As can the FO’s (but not the Captain’s) cockpit side window. For the main entry and galley servicing doors the outside opening feature is to facilitate loading / unloading by ground staff. For the other doors, hatches, and windows, outside opening facilitates rescuers & firefighters getting in to suppress fire and/or remove survivors. To answer @enipla’s question … On most narrowbody jets the side windows adjacent to both the pilot seats open. Once unlatched they translate inwards a couple inches then slide aft on a track. That is the cockpit crew’s emergency escape hatch. There’s a rope installed there that can be tossed out the window then one can shinny down to the ground. On larger jets there is either the same arrangement or a hatch in the cockpit ceiling that includes some means to climb up to it, and some means of getting from atop the fuselage down to the ground. Maybe an inertia reel slowing device akin to rapelling gear, or maybe a rope ladder. But something to get you from 15-50 feet above the ground down to the surface with (ideally) no broken limbs. And at least one of these cockpit hatches / windows will be equipped with a flush-mounted exterior handle to release it too. Again so rescuers can get themselves, or their firefighting spray nozzle, inside. ---
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2023, 3:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-you-break-into-your-house/984159/110 "2023-05-31T15:41:56Z")
Thank you for a very thorough explanation. ---
**Author:** ![racer72](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/racer72/32/3075_2.png) [@racer72](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/racer72)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2023, 3:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-you-break-into-your-house/984159/111 "2023-05-31T15:51:32Z")
We have a keypad to open our garage door. It is our main method of entering the house, we haven’t used the front door in years. If that did not work, 3 of our neighbors have a key to our house and we have keys to theirs. We take turns feeding pets and watering plants when someone has to leave town. ---
**Author:** ![enipla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/54ee81/32.png) [@enipla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/enipla)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2023, 4:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-you-break-into-your-house/984159/112 "2023-05-31T16:16:31Z")
> [@Alessan](#): > > Thank you for a very thorough explanation. Very much so. That makes sense. I thought the passenger locked the outside entry from the jetway. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2023, 5:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-you-break-into-your-house/984159/113 "2023-05-31T17:25:36Z")
There’s no locking feature on the cabin doors. Even if somehow a passenger was left alone on the airplane and they chose to fully close the main entry door from the outside as if ready for departure, there’s nothing to prevent someone else on the jetbridge later from opening it right back up. One totally unrelated scenario that can happen, and therefore has happened someplace sometime, is that the cockpit controls can be left in a configuration where the aircraft will self-pressurize as soon as the last door is closed. It takes several cockpit items set to non-standard configurations. And would be very unlikely to occur mid-day in normal passenger airline ops. But if the HVAC systems are set up to pressurize, and somehow all the cargo doors and cabin doors get closed simultaneously, the last door to close will spring the trap and the uninhabited airplane begins building internal pressure. Which pressure very quickly wedges all the doors closed. Now you’re stuck. The airplane has overpressure relief valves, so it won’t simply inflate until it bursts like a chubby Fisher Price toy. But you need to cut off the supply of HVAC air from the outside then wait for the pressure to leak down enough to get a door open to get access to inside. That’ll piss away 30 plus minutes and guarantee your great grandboss knows your name. At least for a few days until somebody else does something equally bone-headed and you get forgotten. Back in Ye Olden Dayes of Yore there were airliner types where setting _most_ of this trap was part of the normal procedure for prepping the plane to sit unattended at night in freezing conditions. All it took was a small brain fart and a little bad luck for the crew starting out in the oh-dark-thirty chill and suddenly they’d locked themselves and everybody else out until they could depressurize and get a door open. I’ve never done it myself, but I’ve come close. And I know people who did. Again much more likely on now-obsolete types. ---
**Author:** ![Mama\_Zappa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/71e660/32.png) [@Mama\_Zappa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mama_Zappa)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2023, 8:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-you-break-into-your-house/984159/114 "2023-06-01T20:53:30Z")
> [@pullin](#): > > Upset because I cooperated with police, he promised to return to my house and finish what he started. > [@pullin](#): > > One serious breakin attempt has been made. This nearly destroyed a steel security door, caving it partially inward and prying out a few feet of the surrounding frame, along with the concrete threshold. Yikes, yikes, yikes. Was that attempt attributed to this paragon of humanity? ---
**Author:** ![pullin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/c57346/32.png) [@pullin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pullin)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2023, 11:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-you-break-into-your-house/984159/115 "2023-06-02T11:39:57Z")
> [@Mama\_Zappa](#): > > Was that attempt attributed to this paragon of humanity? Not sure. We’d ceased all interaction with the police/justice-system, so never reported it. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-you-break-into-your-house/984159.md?page=5)