A320 crash

[dutchroll]

Not sure I agree with sone of the points in that article.

 

Firstly, as I've said, you can get in from the outside in an emergency. However the pilots can override this function (they must actually be conscious to do it as it requires physical action). If they couldn't override it and a terrorist discovers how to do it, well you're totally screwed and back to square one.

 

Secondly I'm not sure what the benefit of the double-door system would be over the single door + CCTV system. Larger aircraft have a cockpit toilet anyway. On medium size or smaller aircraft you simply can't be anywhere in the vicinity of the door without us knowing you're there (and that includes hiding in the lavatory, which is indicated to us obviously not by a camera, but by other means).

 

So now they want to protect the passengers from the passengers, and the passengers from the pilots. How the heck do you accomplish both?

 

 

[fly_tornado]

Pay pilots better, better working conditions, more holidays.

 

 

[PA.]

On medium size or smaller aircraft you simply can't be anywhere in the vicinity of the door without us knowing you're there (and that includes hiding in the lavatory, which is indicated to us obviously not by a camera, but by other means).

Aroma?

 

 

[shafs64]

there is some talk the airline is not releasing any details about the FO. but they have named the captain.

 

 

[fly_tornado]

German prosecutors confirm only 1 Germanwings pilot was in cockpit at crash, but don't know which it was - @Reuters

 

 

[red750]

Reports this morning that the 28yo co-pilot set several switches causing the aircraft to go into a descent into the mountain and was heard to scream in the last couple of seconds before hitting the mountain. The passengers were all aware of what was happening.

 

 

[johnm]

option 1: toilet in cockpit

 

option 2: drinks trolley that converts to battering ram

 

option 3: electrified pilot seats controlled by 1st class passengers (if no 1st class than row 13)

 

option 4: duress button in cabin - aircraft then coverts to fly by wire - pilots are then redundant on flight

 

option 5: ................

 

 

[jetjr]

Always have 2 people in cockpit

 

Pilot leaves, someone else enters.

 

I think some airlines do this already

 

 

[red750]

CNN aviation reporter Richard Quest said on Sunrise this morning that 3 airlines in Europe including Easyjet have announced they are about to implement a '2 in the cockpit at all times' policy and most are expected to do likewise within the next month.

 

 

[DGL Fox]

The person that is sent in to the cockpit to be the 2nd person while the captain or co pilot go for a break I think would need to be a trained person not just a hostie....

 

David

 

 

[bexrbetter]

He was a 28 year old good looking guy living alone or with his parents.

 

A schoolmate of Lubitz told the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung that he had taken a break because of depression. The woman said: 'Apparently he had burnout, he was in depression.'

 

He said that Lubitz ' took a break in his training six years ago. Then he did the tests (technical and psychological) again. And we was deemed 100 per cent fit to fly.

 

'I am not able to state the reasons why he took the break for several months.'

 

 

[DGL Fox]

A depressed and suicidal co pilot...and no one picked it up...makes me feel really confident to jump on a commercial aircraft no matter which airline company it is...

 

David

 

 

[dutchroll]

Now that's a knee jerk if ever there was one. There's no evidence that a 5ft-nothing hostie being in the cockpit is going to stop a guy who is determined to do something bad.

 

And if the pilots aren't insane already, calling Effie to ask permission to go to the loo urgently is going to drive them that way very quickly.

 

Classic case of "let's do something ineffective urgently so we can be seen to be taking action, then we'll ignore the root causes".

 

 

[johnm]

a terrible incident & with all respect to the living ................ this could well be a murder suicide (if the reported facts are true) - the pilot murdered 150 persons - as some other articles state, there should be a way where the passengers can be protected from that small percentage of rouge pilots (as well as vicki versa)

 

 

[farri]

If it is correct, as reported, that the other pilot couldn`t get back into the cockpit because the door was locked (bolted ) from the inside, then to me, that system is flawed and partly responsible for the result.

 

Frank.

 

 

[fly_tornado]

Pilots pay a huge price for the privilege of sitting in an airline cockpit and the airlines are slowly screwing them financially.

 

 

[dutchroll]

If it is correct, as reported, that the other pilot couldn`t get back into the cockpit because the door was locked (bolted ) from the inside, then to me, that system is flawed and partly responsible for the result.Frank.

So when the electric lock fails, how do you secure the cockpit door? It has actually happened more than once. They're electro-mechanical devices for a reason, and such devices sometimes do fail. You can't reach the door from your seating position, and if you have to get up every time to open it, that creates whole new problems by itself, not least of which is when one pilot goes to the loo and the other pilot has to let him back in which is of course an every-day occurrence.

People think that it's only to prevent a terror attack. Well yes, but that's not all. We've had violent/drunk/drugged/angry/aggressive passengers force their way up front and bang on the cockpit door more than once. The age we're living in seems to create an environment where if you're ticked off, you simply demand to see the boss of the plane, and if they won't let you, you go up there to try to confront him yourself.

 

I mean, you have a choice. Either the cockpit is virtually attack-proof from the cabin side, or it isn't. If people now choose for it to not be, I hope they don't come complaining to me when things turn really ugly. This tragic event cost over a hundred lives. September 11 cost nearly 3000 lives and proved that determined people could use fuel-laden airliners as missiles.

 

 

[Birdseye]

Just imagine, ICAO comes up with a guideline about cockpit manning, then due to poor amendment of legislation wording CASA bans all single pilot aircraft...............

 

 

[farri]

dutchtroll, Thanks, I was hoping you would respond!

 

I`m not an aeronautical engineer so I wouldn`t recommend how to change the door locking system, but as I said in my post above, a system that doesn`t allow a cockpit door to be opened from the outside,is flawed.

 

There must be a way to open the cockpit door from the outside and the flight crew must know how to activate it.

 

This morning, my wife told me about the report that was given on the TV news. When she told me that the pilot couldn`t get back into the cockpit, my mind immediately went to what you said in one of you earlier post and if I got it correctly, you said that the door could be " bolted" from the inside. Is it any wonder then, that the pilot couldn`t back inside?

 

Frank.

 

Ps, Please correct me if I`m wrong.

 

 

[fly_tornado]

the door is designed to lock the passengers out of the cockpit. the lock has 3 options open, closed or lock.

 

2 pilot murder suicides is hardly reason to assume this system is faulty.

 

 

[ayavner]

you can't think of everything. Of all the things to worry about flying commercially, it seems we are soon to be conditioned to add this to the list. Heartbreaking on almost every imaginable level, for all involved (and uninvolved).

 

 

[PA.]

Here is a list of planes that have experienced door security issues.

 

http://www.theage.com.au/world/germanwings-plane-crash-crashes-and-near-misses-related-to-cockpit-door-locks-20150327-1m8o5b.html

 

No mention of MH370 in the list but I think most people would expect it to be on the list if/when it is found.

 

The Egyptian and Asian planes that also are missing from the list.

 

Still a very small number of flights and I rather have the door as it is.

 

 

[fly_tornado]

The real question is, would pilots be flying safer having a cavalcade of drunken idiots passing through the cockpit?

 

 

[dutchroll]

dutchtroll, Thanks, I was hoping you would respond!

Glad to be of service!

There are several issues here which are getting slightly muddled in the overload of media reporting, etc:

 

Opening the cockpit door from the outside (e.g., unconscious pilot etc) - yes this can be done and all pilots and cabin crew know how to do this. The procedure activates the electro-mechanical lock after a time delay.

 

Why a time delay? So that a conscious pilot can override the access request in the case of a security procedure breach or suspicious access request.

 

Bolting the cockpit door from inside the cockpit - yes, this is a backup security measure in case of failure of the electro-mechanical locking system, and would also be used if someone was trying to seriously beat the door down as it provides significant additional locking strength. It requires you to get out of the seat to do this.

 

I don't really know what they can do to mitigate a seriously suicidal pilot, apart from not having him there in the first place. There are any number of ways that the guy flying the plane could deliberately crash it before anyone else either inside or outside the cockpit had a chance to do anything about it, short of having both pilots superglued into the seats for the entire flight (in which case he might struggle to achieve that suicidal aim).

 

 

[Bandit12]

I don't really know what they can do to mitigate a seriously suicidal pilot, apart from not having him there in the first place.

And speaking with just a hint of experience with suicidal individuals (not pilots though), effective screening to prevent a person like this from being at the controls would be incredibly restrictive. By the time everyone who might be a risk was removed, there would be very few flying at all. Wait, that sounds suspiciously like a CASA risk management strategy......best not give them ideas.