This article from NYTimes.com has been sent to you by psa188@xxxxxxxxx /-------------------- advertisement -----------------------\ Explore more of Starbucks at Starbucks.com. http://www.starbucks.com/default.asp?ci=1015 \----------------------------------------------------------/ Airline Pilots Set to Carry Firearms April 18, 2003 By PHILIP SHENON GLYNCO, Ga., April 17 - After a graduation ceremony this weekend, a group of pilots from several of the nation's largest airlines will return home with a special gift from the federal government: a .40-caliber semiautomatic handgun that, beginning next week, they can carry into the cockpits of their planes. The 46 pilots, most of them gray-haired veterans of the airline industry who volunteered to travel to southern Georgia this week for the first federal training class for armed pilots, say they cannot wait to get back into the sky - this time, armed to protect their passengers from the threat of terrorist hijackers. "When the cockpit door is closed, you really don't know what's going to be on the other side," said one of the pilots in training here in the government's Federal Flight Deck Officer program, which is being organized by the Transportation Security Administration. "The idea is to protect the flight deck at all costs," the pilot said. Another of the students, a 14-year veteran of the industry who like her classmates was not allowed to give her name or identify her employer, said that "it's a different world now" and that she needed a gun "to defend my passengers, to defend my cockpit." The many other federal aviation precautions taken since the suicide hijackings of Sept. 11, 2001, had been useful, including the reinforcement of cockpit doors, she said, "but it's not enough." Assuming they all complete the weeklong course of weapons and counterterrorism training required by Congress when it decided last year to allow pilots to carry guns, these 43 men and 3 women will be back in their cockpits with guns when they return to work as early as next week. They will be followed by tens of thousands more airline pilots who are expected to seek the special gun permits in years to come. But before they get the right to carry firearms onboard, they must prove themselves this week to instructors like Don Garron, who teaches judo-like defense techniques. He pitted teams of the T-shirted pilots against each other this afternoon - "good guys, bad guys" - and asked them to wrestle with red plastic knives and toy guns. "Try to stab your partner," he barked at a classroom of about 20 of the pilots, a collection of mostly middle-aged men, some in good physical shape, others pot-bellied and sweating heavily as they picked themselves up off blue plastic mats set across the floor. "I want you to shove the knife into their gut," Mr. Garron yelled, urging the pilots to pretend that an attacker had tried to raid a cockpit. "They're in the cabin, they're in the flight deck!" Officials here of the Transportation Security Administration, which had initially joined with the airline industry in opposing the idea of arming pilots, say they have come to believe that weapons in the cockpit could bolster safety. "This is a new level of security," said John K. Moran, deputy assistant administrator for law enforcement and security. "We believe that this is going to be a very strong deterrent to anybody who might want to reach a cockpit." He said that the first class of pilots represented some of the finest aviators in the industry and that several of them had had distinguished military careers and extensive weapons training before joining the airlines. The first class of students in the Flight Deck Officer program were selected from volunteers who were nominated by the Air Line Pilots Association, the pilots' major union, and a smaller pilots group. Pilots groups had been pressing for years for the right to arm pilots, even before the Sept. 11 attacks, over the objections of their employers, who have insisted that the presence of guns in the cockpits raises obvious safety issues and could distract pilots from their central jobs. Under the program approved by Congress as a legacy of Sept. 11, the pilots are not required to tell their employers about their participation in the training until after they have graduated. That reflects an effort to protect the pilots' privacy should they fail to complete the program, which includes a criminal background check and a psychological examination. The Transportation Security Administration said that 48 pilots had begun the class this week and that two had left for reasons that instructors would not explain to reporters who were invited to witness the training here today. The pilots who complete the course, which includes lectures with names like "The Psychology of Survival," will each take home the .40-caliber pistol, a supply of ammunition, a holster and a metal lockbox. Under the conditions of the program, pilots will be required to carry the weapon into the plane in the lockbox covered in a nondescript cloth bag, and to take the gun out of the lockbox only after they are in the cockpit. If they travel home as a passenger instead of in the cockpit, the guns would be carried inside the lockboxes in special areas of the cargo hold. Some pilots in the program acknowledged knowing colleagues who, for a variety of physical and emotional reasons, should not carry guns onto a plane, even though they were more than competent to fly safely. "I think there are a lot of cops who shouldn't be carrying a gun," said Stephen Luckey, a former 747 pilot for Northwest Airlines who is now a safety specialist with the Air Line Pilots Association and joined in the training here this week. "But for most pilots, this is long overdue." Mr. Luckey pointed out that this is not the first time commercial pilots have carried guns into cockpits. Beginning in the 1970's, he was among about 10 pilots who were allowed to carry firearms in planes. In the 1950's, airline pilots on flights carrying United States mail were allowed to carry guns. The captain of an American Airlines DC-6 shot and fatally wounded a 15-year-old who tried to hijack his plane in Cleveland in July 1954. http://www.nytimes.com/2003/04/18/international/worldspecial/18PILO.html?ex=1051674780&ei=1&en=7c7e09a498d9b1ea HOW TO ADVERTISE --------------------------------- For information on advertising in e-mail newsletters or other creative advertising opportunities with The New York Times on the Web, please contact onlinesales@xxxxxxxxxxx or visit our online media kit at http://www.nytimes.com/adinfo For general information about NYTimes.com, write to help@xxxxxxxxxxxx Copyright 2003 The New York Times Company