Flying under radar harder post-9/11 for foreign students who want to train in ... - Washington Post
"Prior to 9/11, I wouldn't have had the phone number and name of my local FBI agent posted on my wall. I do," said Patrick Murphy, director of training at Sunrise Aviation in Ormond Beach, Fla., near Daytona Beach.
Hundreds of U.S. flight schools fiercely compete for students. In Florida, some still pitch the good weather as a way for students to fly more often and finish programs faster. The 9/11 hijackers sought out U.S. schools partly because they were seen as requiring shorter training periods.
Florida schools have reason to be careful: Three of the 9/11 hijackers were simulating flights in large jets within six months of arriving for training in Venice, Fla., along the Gulf Coast. Mohamed Atta, the operational leader of the hijackings, and Marwan al Shehhi enrolled in an accelerated pilot program at Huffman Aviation, while Ziad Jarrah entered a private pilot program nearby.
The terrorists obtained licenses and certifications despite rowdy behavior and poor performance at times.
The U.S. commission that investigated the attacks said in its report that Atta and Shehhi quickly took solo flights and passed a private pilot airman test. The two later enrolled at another school, where an instructor said the two were rude and aggressive, and sometimes even fought to take over the controls during training flights. They failed an instruments rating exam. Undeterred, they returned to Huffman. Meanwhile, Jarrah received a single-engine private pilot certificate.
Hani Hanjour obtained his private pilot license after about three months of training in Arizona. Several more months of training yielded a commercial pilot certificate, issued by the Federal Aviation Administration. In early 2001, he started training on a Boeing 737 simulator. An instructor found his work substandard and advised him to quit, but he continued and finished the training just 5½ months before the attacks, the commission said.
Today, it would be tougher for the four men to enter U.S. flight schools.
There is a stricter visa process for foreign students seeking flight training in the U.S. They cannot start until the Transportation Security Administration, created after Sept. 11 to protect U.S. air travel, runs a fingerprint-based criminal background check and runs their names against terrorist watch lists. TSA inspectors visit FAA-certified flight schools at least once a year to make sure students have proper documentation verifying their identities and haven't overstayed their visas.
Plus, TSA shares intelligence with other agencies and has other layers of security to catch people before they can do harm even if they slipped through the cracks and were able to get flight training in the U.S.
30 Aug, 2011--
Source: http://news.google.com/news/url?sa=t&fd=R&usg=AFQjCNE8zp8KJBzVPdp4maWNW_mFQ7zByQ&url=http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/flying-under-radar-harder-post-911-for-foreign-students-who-want-to-train-in-us-holes-remain/2011/08/30/gIQAxEKxoJ_story.html
~
Manage subscription | Powered by rssforward.com
