Checks and Balances of Airport Security

Re “Government Moving Quickly to Find More Secure Cockpit Doors,” Sept. 19: More secure cockpit doors are not the answer. To open the door a terrorist need only say to the pilot, “I’ll kill one passenger every minute until this door is opened” or “My fellow terrorist is at your home now and will kill your spouse and family if this door isn’t opened.”

Forcing cash-strapped airlines to pay $50,000 per aircraft will not stop hijackings. Keeping terrorists off the planes should be the focus of our time and money.

Sylvia Miles

Newbury Park

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Equip planes with a sleeping-gas cartridge, operable from the cockpit, which will flood the passenger compartment with gas without affecting the cockpit.

Cary E. Cook

Tustin

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The BB gun of my boyhood is the only gun I have ever shot. I keep wondering whether these vile deeds might not have happened had there been at least one passenger on each of the four planes who had carried a concealed gun.

I keep wondering, too, why we should believe those who insist a missile defense system is superfluous, given the obvious fact that terrorists will attack by any means possible--as their vile deeds prove.

John Carl Brogdon

Long Beach

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If it took all day to prepare to board an airplane I would not object to stringent security measures. Patience is a virtue and, in the name of saving lives by aborting a tragedy, I am all for it. We must do whatever it takes to protect our fellow Americans. I have no objections to a body pat-down and search of my purse if it means saving lives.

Jodi Lawson

Burbank

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I would find no discomfort in being required to wear my seat belt during a flight and to seek permission to remove it.

Ronald Webster

Long Beach

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In their zealous haste to lock the barn now that the horses have been stolen elsewhere, the security folks at LAX have eagerly confiscated thousands of nail clippers, cuticle scissors, corkscrews and umbrellas from would-be travelers. However, they must have allowed many people to board airplanes while carrying pencils and ballpoint pens which, in the wrong hands, could do at least as much damage as some of the other items. I expect this serious oversight to be corrected as soon as they read this letter. This is ridiculous!

Ralph L. Merrill

Long Beach