Date: Wed, 26 Sep 2001 14:46:39 -0400
To: Matthew Gaylor <freematt@coil.com>
From: Matthew Gaylor <freematt@coil.com>
Subject: Pilots debate tough tactics to foil attacks
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" ; format="flowed"

<http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-0109260220sep26.story>

 From the Chicago Tribune

Pilots debate tough tactics to foil attacks
By Flynn McRoberts and Rogers Worthington
Tribune staff reporters

September 26, 2001

Gone, for now, is the chatter within flight crews about weather, 
flight paths and what to do once they reach their destination. Thanks 
to the events of Sept. 11, pilots across America are preparing their 
co-pilots and flight attendants for trouble.

In e-mails and pilot lounges, they are swapping ideas about how to 
fight back against hijackers: packing firearms, using coffeepots and 
cockpit crash axes as weapons, or rolling the plane so attackers are 
knocked off their feet.

At least one pilot even urged passengers to rise up and pummel 
attackers. It was just the most dramatic example of how, since 
terrorists converted jetliners into guided missiles, flight crews 
have abandoned the painfully obsolete idea that a hijacker merely 
wants ransom money or a trip to Cuba.

As their union leaders and Bush administration officials disagreed 
Tuesday on a range of proposals--from arming pilots to federalizing 
airport security--pilots and flight attendants continued the debate 
in America's cockpits and cabins:

How far should they go in enlisting passengers in the potential fight 
against would-be terrorists without scaring most of their customers 
away?
That debate has broadened to the flying public with the wide 
circulation of one account--a United Airlines pilot who tutored 
passengers over the PA system on how to foil any potential hijackers.

"Everybody stand up at once and start throwing things at this person 
and his confederates if he has any," Peter Hannaford, a former Reagan 
aide, recalled the pilot as saying. "Throw anything you can: shoes, 
pillows, books, magazines, even eyeglasses and especially blankets. 
Somebody try to rush him and get a blanket over this person and 
tackle them to the ground." Hannaford said the passengers on board 
the flight from Denver to Dulles applauded.  So did many other pilots 
who later heard the story.

[...]


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