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Can you break a cockpit door?

Pilots (and, presumably, flight crew members) used to be able to break through cockpit doors if necessary, but newer, reinforced cockpit doors prevent that. The cockpit voice recorder on flight 9525 revealed that the captain of the plane tried to break into the cockpit with no success.



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Practically, you cannot break down the cockpit door. If you could, you'd have to worry about hijackers doing the same thing. So, to avoid a Germanwings situation you want an airlines whose general policies mirror FAA regulations.

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The door to the cockpit locks automatically, but a keypad outside allows a flight attendant to input a security code to request entry. A buzzer sounds and the pilots, who can verify the crew member through a peephole or video surveillance, must switch the door control inside the cockpit to “unlock” to release the door.

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Extremely secure — so secure that they can withstand gunfire and even small grenades.

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Under this program, flight crew members are authorized by the Transportation Security Administration to use firearms to defend against acts of criminal violence or air piracy undertaken to gain control of their aircraft.

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Do pilots have an override code for the cockpit door? If there is no response from the cockpit for a request to open the door, the flight crew can enter an override code on the keypad, which also sets off a 30-second alert in the cockpit, according to the training video.

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This happened on British Airways Flight 5390 in 1990. An engineer had sight matched a retaining bolt on the windscreen and it blew out as the plane climbed through 17,000 ft. The explosive decompression pulled the captain halfway out of the broken window, and his clothes caught on the flight controls.

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No they are not, at least not fully. There have been instances of equipment failure caused by coffee spills, resulting in the need to abort the flight.

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While the flight deck used to be accessible to passengers and especially children, it has been strictly closed off since the beginning of the millennium. In the meantime, only the pilots and, in exceptional cases such as some standby flights, airline employees are allowed to fly in the cockpit.

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Yes, you can enter the cockpit if the captain or the first officer allows you that too before take off or after landing. While cruising it's NOT ALLOWED.

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At least with U.S. military or the U.S. produced Chinook cargo helicopters ( other countries buy/use them) bulletproof glass does not exist in the cockpit. The only protection pilots have are armored seats in the cockpit.

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It is understood that some airlines already adopt such a procedure, whereby if a pilot wishes to take a break, they must first call a crew member into the cockpit and once they have entered, only then can the pilot exit the cockpit - Something which more, if not all airlines could adopt.

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There's no fixed number – each individual is unique, as is the ejection that they endure. After ejection, a pilot will be given a full medical evaluation and it is down to that medical professional to advise whether it is recommended that the pilot continues to fly or not.

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Leff was quick to point out that while pilots snapping photos from the cockpit is completely safe, instances of pilots taking lewd photographs or inviting, ahem, adult film actresses into the cockpit during flight has not done the idea any favors over the years.

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The unit must declare weapons and ammunition to the aircraft operator. Weapons must be unloaded. Weapons must be collectively secured in a crate and banded or individually locked in a hard-sided case.

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