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http://ntsb.gov/ntsb/brief.asp?ev_id=20001213X32679&key=1
It wasn't always insane. The above URL references the murder-hijacking of PSA 1771, 12/7/1987. A recently fired US Air (US Air had recently taken over PSA, sadly) station agent at LAX brought a handgun through the terminal security checkpoint and eventually shot a fellow "non-rev" traveller enroute to SFO before storming the cockpit and shooting both pilots and forcing the four-engine BAE-146 jet into a steep dive impacting the idyllic hills of northwestern San Luis Obispo County, California leaving not much of a debris field, as I understand it. This occurred about 20 miles from where I grew up and lived at the time. The next day, upon reporting for work at the San Luis Obispo County Airport where I was a 23 year old station agent for Wings West Airlines, it was made clear that no longer would an airline ID badge be suitable for bypassing security screening. Forthwith, all airline pilots (and other employees), whether reporting for duty on Wings West or SkyWest (also operating out of SBP) or uniformed and credentialled major airline pilots commuting to work out of LAX or SFO, etc. would have to submit to regular screening, just like the passengers. But here's the rub: flight crews (pilots, there were no FA's there then) for Wings West didn't have to comply with the screening process when accessing their aircraft from some point other than the terminal (in view of the public, in other words), e.g., from the maintenance hangar/corporate offices facility a short walk from the terminal apron/ramp (or "tarmac" for you faux-romantic avio-anglophiles; though it was made of concrete, not tar-macadam, i.e., asphalt), demonstrating that the new, knee-jerk regulatory reaction was simply public-relations "look-we're-doing-something" falderol by the FAA. No one seemed to understand then, as now, that cockpit flight crews don't need to carry weapons on board to commit murder-suicide. Either pilot is in a position to do something rash and irreversibly fatal at any of several highly critical phases of flight that the other has little, if any, ability to counter effectively... I'm thinking of things like pulling one (of 2) engine's power lever into reverse thrust immediately after takeoff (SA-227 "Metroliner" turboprop and the like, back then) or similar theoretical suicidal hijack highkjinks now. But you know, nothing like that has ever happened (I'm aware of FedEx's bloody attempted hijack by an insane jump-seating flight crew member using hammers and a spear-gun or the like; and with the possible exception of that Egyptian airliner a few years back)– and I think the TSA should seriously consider removing those truly wickedly sharp crash-axes (hatchets) from airliner cockpits. Not only can those things easily chop through aluminum, they can swiftly split a skull in half. They should ban those dangerous things before an airline pilot goes berserk. It seemed to me at the time, as it does now, that if we can't trust our properly credentialled and attired flight crew members to not bring bombs, guns and large blades aboard, should we really be trusting them with the whole airplane? Just a thought. Maybe I'm missing a crucial detail.
