Aviation Security

Since the game-changing "suicide hijack" of four US airliners on the 11th September, 2001, an estimated $40 billion plus has been spent on US intelligence and security systems. Meanwhile, the on-board methodology for dealing with aircraft hijackings has been turned on its head. Among security measures adopted since 9/11, only one has been completely successful–so far. Its aim was to prevent hijackers taking effective control of aircraft and using them as weapons. The measure adopted was to fit hardened, bullet-proof security doors between the cabin and the cockpit, controllable by the pilots from within the cockpit. That system, adopted worldwide along with crew procedures ensuring the physical isolation of the flightdeck from the cabin between pushback and arrival on-stand at destination, has ensured that there have been no successful hijacks of large Western airliners since, and certainly no hijacker has been able to commandeer a large airborne aircraft.

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