The good old days....We used to be able buy by these from the harware store http://www.nfatoys.com/tsmg/ but should we allow it once again?

I remember flying Provincetown-Boston Airlines (PBA) intra-Florida when there wasn't a cockpit door or even a cockpit. The 8 or so pax just sat in the same cabin with the solitary pilot.

Where the co-pilot would normally sit was used as just another pax seat.

What a difference a few years makes.

9/11 is over: http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/30/op...on&oref=slogin

Even seeing the thread title alone I wondered if it was about NZ domestic prop flights. Yup only jet flights (or rather a/c with 100+ seats) and all international flights require security here.

Flying puddlejumpers (eg Beech 1900D) there is no door to shut. Jetstream32, while uncomfortable a/c to fly in, is even better. If you can get the middle bulkhead seat you are right behind the pilots where a door would be on a bigger aircraft.

You can even find this in the U.S., today! Just fly ScenicAir from North Las Vegas to the Grand Canyon.

Or, in Canada, fly a Twin Otter between Victoria and Vancouver Harbor.

PenAir, Anchorage to Dutch Harbor, has no security and even involves a decent-sized airport. The plane, though, is a Saab 340 - maybe there is a jet/prop distinction.

Used to be that planes with less than a certain number of pax didn't need screening. At one time (mid 90's), there was a group of 2-3 gates at one end of a DFW concourse that was unsecured and used by a small set of commuter flights using small aircraft. I forget what the number was, but it was on the order of 15, 16 people.

I, too, recall when airlines left the flight deck open. I was on an Austrian transatlantic flight where the flight deck was open from push-back to gate arrival. Yet we (and all other flights) had armed escort from landing to the gate....

Mesa Air (until April 2007) with flights Watertown NY to Pittsburgh used the Beech 1900D. Big Sky Airlines took over and offers flights to Boston and Albany and they also use the Beech 1900D. In fact, I believe they bought their planes from Mesa!

Probably not many terrorists flying through Watertown NY these days!

Used to be that planes with less than a certain number of pax didn't need screening. At one time (mid 90's), there was a group of 2-3 gates at one end of a DFW concourse that was unsecured and used by a small set of commuter flights using small aircraft. I forget what the number was, but it was on the order of 15, 16 people.

I, too, recall when airlines left the flight deck open. I was on an Austrian transatlantic flight where the flight deck was open from push-back to gate arrival. Yet we (and all other flights) had armed escort from landing to the gate....

IIRC, If the plane carries less than 19 pax, so like anything smaller than a Beech 19000D, and it arrives and departs from non-secure sections of airports then it doesn't need security screening.

All PenAir, Era Aviation, and Frontier Flying Service flights in Alaska have no security screening. It has to do with the operating certificate they operate under. This includes flights in/out of Anchorage and Fairbanks. It's nice.

New Zealand has less guns and less morons than the US. We should at least have metal detectors.

The biggest a/c currently not requiring screening in NZ is ATR 72-500, seats 66 (or 70 I think an extra row has been added).

In 2005, I flew Great Lakes Airlines twice between Denver and North Platte, Nebraska for depositions. Both times departing North Platte, TSA screeners patted down most of the pasengers, none of whom set off the WTMD and all of whom dutifully removed their shoes for the oh-so-effective X-ray check. My guess is that the Denver FSD, Spiff's favorite Patrick Ahlstrom, ordered these measures because no one was going to enter his domain unscreened.

In stark contrast to the Kabuki Security Theater in North Platte, Great Lakes Airlines flies Saab 1900 19 seat turboprop aircraft on this route. These aircraft do not have cockpit doors but rather curtains similar to those that used to separate first class from coach. It is amazing to see the altimeter register drops of hundreds of feet when caught in Rocky Mountain wind shear. Funny, none of these planes have been commandeered due to lack of cockpit doors. Must be the stringent security measures.

I am sure the passenger demographics in both North Platte and New Zealand have nothing to do with security measures taken in the respective airports.

Has a Tommy gun ever decided on its own to shoot people? Are Tommy guns self-aiming? Can a Tommy gun eject a spent magazine, whether drum or stick, and reload to target more people?