By Alan Levin, USA Today
Pilots unions’ responses to remaining questions Federal officials, airlines and safety advocates say many issues need to be resolved before pilots should be armed. Pilots’ unions say the issues are easily fixed.
International flights
Before pilots can carry weapons on flights into other countries, the U.S. government must sign agreements with each nation. The government also worries how it would respond if other nations began arming their pilots.
Pilots’ response: Federal air marshals and FBI agents carry weapons on overseas assignments. Similar deals could be worked out for pilots, who would become deputized law officers under current proposals.
Cockpit modifications
Can pilots carry a gun in a holster or should guns be stored during flight? Would different storage equipment be required for different aircraft models?
Pilots’ response: Products have been identified that could be used to hold weapons in cockpits. Major modifications would not be needed.
Airport security
Thousands of pilots a day would be entitled to bring guns into airports. Some consultants worry about increased risks that guns would be stolen and used by hijackers. It also might require altering security checkpoints.
Pilots’ response: Many law enforcement officers carry weapons in airports, and adding pilots to the group would create no risks. Pilots advocate using lockboxes to store the weapons. The Transportation Security Administration backs the lockbox concept.
Training
Federal officials say they shouldn’t be rushed to create a training program. Training needs to consider safety, interaction with other security forces and the issues of firing a weapon in a cockpit.
Pilots’ response: The Air Line Pilots Association has proposed a 48-hour training program based on work conducted with pilots in the 1970s.
The association suggests holding an initial test session to fine-tune the curriculum. Training could begin within months.
Eligibility
Neither House nor Senate version of the bill spells out whether pilots who want to carry weapons should be subject to more than employment and criminal background checks.
Pilots’ response: The Air Line Pilots Association wants broader checks that would exclude pilots with histories of domestic violence or credit problems.
Sources: Transportation Security Administration, airlines, Air Line Pilots Association, USA TODAY research
WASHINGTON - Since the Senate voted overwhelmingly last month to arm up to 85,000 airline pilots, carriers and safety advocates have raised numerous concerns about cost, security and safety.
But so far, no one appears to be listening.
Despite renewed criticism from airline executives and private worries from some government officials, the measure seems certain to become law. The politics of guns has overwhelmed the slower-moving aviation world, according to officials, lobbyists and Capitol Hill insiders.
Vigorous lobbying by pilots and gun rights groups, who say concerns about the proposal have been overblown, eroded most objections from Congress. Proposals to make airline pilots eligible to carry guns passed the House of Representatives in July and the Senate in September. Groups such as the National Rifle Association urged lawmakers to vote for the measure, and few wanted to oppose it in an election year. Even some liberal lawmakers who generally favor gun control embraced the idea.
But the House and Senate versions, which must be merged before being sent to the president, do not specify how pilots would be trained, how weapons would be transported between flights or how the measure would be paid for.
Only a small fraction of the 5,000 to 10,000 airline pilots who fly each day are expected to volunteer to carry a gun.
The Bush administration initially opposed arming pilots, but that position weakened under intense lobbying. Transportation Security Administration acting head James Loy says he will follow Congress’ wishes, though he would prefer to begin with a small test program instead of allowing all pilots to participate.
Airlines, which were slow to mobilize against the measure, are starting to speak out. Officials say the House and Senate proposals do not consider potential problems, from how pilots can safely carry weapons in secure airport terminals to what might happen if a stray shot damages aircraft electronics.
“There’s so many unknowns,” says Dave Barger, president of JetBlue airline. “I don’t think the legislation has really been thought out.”
Aviation safety advocates say giving pilots the added responsibility for security could threaten safety by disrupting them from their normal routines.
“We’ve trained these pilots so carefully, and we’ve engrained in them that predictable routine makes it safe,” says Susan Coughlin, a former member of the National Transportation Safety Board who is president of the Aviation Safety Alliance. “Let’s let them do that and let law enforcement do the rest.”
Coughlin and other former NTSB members plan to issue a letter criticizing the proposal.
Loy convened a task force, which included officials from the FBI, Secret Service and the Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco and Firearms, to study the proposal this past summer. It recommended against giving guns to pilots.
“We have some very serious concerns” about the legislation, Loy said last week. “I want to make sure there is a walk-before-we-run mentality.”
Loy told senators this month that if pilots are armed, they should receive individual lockboxes in which to store the weapons while not in the cockpit. The lockboxes would minimize the chances of accidental discharge and theft.
In a letter to senators, he identified other issues: Will cockpits need to be modified to create storage areas for weapons? How will the government respond if foreign nations want to arm their pilots? How will the program be funded?
That last question could prove tricky for the TSA, which has said it cannot meet congressionally mandated security deadlines without additional funding. Estimates of the costs vary. Loy projected up to $900 million in initial costs followed by $250 million per year. The Air Line Pilots Association, the nation’s largest pilots union and a proponent of arming flight crews, estimated it would cost no more than $100 million initially, and probably far less.
Steve Luckey, a retired 747 captain who heads the union’s security committee, concedes that many issues need to be resolved before pilots can be armed. But he says they can be easily overcome. “I strongly believe that if we have this ability, the odds of a recurrence of something like Sept. 11 is greatly diminished,” he says.
Luckey says he has developed the outlines for a training program and anticipates rigorous standards for pilots seeking guns. “I don’t think you can have any kind of cavalier attitude about handing out lethal force to people,” he says. “That’s why I’m on the quality bandwagon, not quantity.”
The gun legislation is part of a larger bill that would create a department of homeland security. That bill is deadlocked in the Senate.
The airlines hope Congress will adopt a test program before opening the program to every pilot.
“It’s dangerous and potentially deadly public policy to enact this proposal in an information vacuum,” says Michael Wascom, spokesman for the airline trade group Air Transport Association.
But there appear to be few allies for such a move on Capitol Hill. Proponents say it’s time the airlines gave up.
“This train has left the station,” NRA Chief Executive Officer Wayne LaPierre says. “They need to get on board, as opposed to trying to figure out how to sabotage an issue that has already been decided.”