United Airlines said Tuesday it is installing steel barriers that can be quickly fastened across front aisles of planes to protect pilots from potential attacks when the cockpit door is opened during flight.
The voluntary security move, the first by a U.S. airline, goes beyond the reinforced
cockpit doors mandated by the Federal Aviation Administration after the suicide
hijackings of four airliners by terrorists on Sept. 11, 2001, authorities said.
“We’ve always been intent on taking security an extra step with a secondary barrier to prevent unauthorized access to the cockpit and protect passengers and crew members from potential harm,” said United spokesman Jeff Green.
Terrorists commandeered two United planes in the Sept. 11 attacks, crashing one into the south tower of the World Trade Center in New York. The second plane plowed into a field in Shanksville, Pa., while passengers tried to prevent the hijackers from flying into the White House or U.S. Capitol.
The security barrier, which Green said looks somewhat like a child gate used in a home, is made of steel cables and extends from the aircraft floor almost to the ceiling. The devices can be slid into a locking position to wall off the food galley, forward-
cabin bathroom and cockpit.
The airline has received FAA approval to mount the barriers, starting with United’s Boeing 757 fleet, officials said.
Airline and federal security officials declined to comment on whether United’s decision to build the double-protection system was linked to recent reports from some flight crews at a number of airlines about suspicious behavior among passengers.
Some individuals have reportedly made aggressive moves toward the cockpit area or disobeyed orders from flight attendants to return to their seats–scenarios that the crews interpreted as possible tests by terrorists of on-board security. In some cases, the passengers attempted to flush out any undercover federal air marshals on the flights, according to the Air Line Pilots Association.
The strengthened cockpit doors ordered by the FAA are bulletproof and designed to withstand a hand grenade explosion. But the flight deck still becomes vulnerable to intruders when the cockpit door is opened while pilots use the bathroom or receive meal trays.
All airlines since Sept. 11 have instructed flight attendants to coordinate communications with the pilots and block access to the cockpit with beverage carts when the cockpit door is open. But the carts would have limited impact slowing down hijackers, officials said. In addition, unsecured carts pose a danger if they are bounced around by turbulence.
FAA officials said the steel barriers, while an improvement over the carts, are not impenetrable.
“The secondary barriers are a visual restraint as well as a physical one,” FAA spokeswoman Diane Spitaliere said.
The barriers would delay an intruder from getting beyond the galley and into the
cockpit, said Amy von Walter, a spokeswoman for the Transportation Security Administration. In tests, the cables withstood the force of beverage carts.
El Al Airlines in Israel and some European carriers have installed bulkheads containing walls at the front of aircraft that completely separate the pilots from the passenger cabin. But such a retrofit would be extremely expensive to carry out on the more than 6,500 planes in the U.S. airline fleet.
United declined to say how much the barrier system is costing to install on its 500 aircraft.
Green said United has installed the barriers on 25 of its 757s and plans to finish the 757 fleet of 97 planes in October. He said the rest of United’s aircraft will be outfitted with the barriers over the next year.
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Edited by Patrick Olsen (polsen@tribune.com) and Drew Sottardi (dsottardi@tribune.com)
