Originally Posted by
CaptainMiles
What we need is a system that separates good guys from bad guys based on their intent, not their identity. This is hard. How do we do that? We can perhaps make a reasonable assumption that, on any flight, if there are bad guys on an airplane they will always be a small minority. (And hey, if we are wrong and an airplane full of bad guys crashes as a result that may not be such a bad thing.) So how about a voting system whereby if the majority (or large percentage) of occupants vote to open the door, the door opens? It could go something like this. FA enters a code to initiate the vote. If during the next 60 seconds 40+ passengers press and hold their reading light buttons simultaneously, then the door opens. Easy for 40 good guys. Can it be abused? Well, it would take 40 bad guys to pull this off, and you never have 40 bad guys on a plane. On the 4U flight, the 4U captain could probably have explained the predicament and gotten 40 pax to go along with him and save this plane. It would also have worked on UA93, without a need to use the galley cart.
One pilot locks another pilot out of the cockpit The pilot who is locked out claims that the pilot flying the plane is trying to crash it. The pilot who is flying the plane comes on the intercom to claim that she's locked the other pilot out of the cabin because he was trying to crash the plane.
Then what?
And if you had that system in place, you'd then have a suicidal pilot choosing the crash the plane in such a way that the passenger vote and re-admittance wouldn't be able to stop it