Fake Pilot 'Hitched A Free Ride In Cockpit'

An unemployed man wore a pilot's uniform to hitch a free ride in the cockpit of a commercial flight, Italian police claim. The 32-year-old was stopped at Turin's Caselle airport on suspicion of using false IDs, a cap and uniform to convince crew he was a qualified pilot. He managed to fly for free inside the cockpit aboard a flight from Munich, Germany, to Turin in April, according to Carabinieri paramilitary police.

Link to story

Ok, this is ridiculous, not only did this man get free air travel (although thats questioned at the end of the article) but was actually sitting in the cockpit of a commercial fight and all from printing up some fake ID and putting on a pilots uniform.

A police statement said the suspect was held on suspicion of putting the security of air transport at risk and "usurping a title".

The suspect put the security of air transport at risk what about the people who are supposed to be looking after the security of air travel in the first place? What charges are going to be bought against them I wonder.

There seems to be a gigantic hole in the whole airport security system here thats just waiting to be exploited by someone with nefarious intentions. Whats the point of checking passengers boarding the plane for nail clippers and suspicious liquids if your just going to let anyone with the right looking hat have access to the cockpit?

thats crazy!

I thought airlines had security measures to counter things like this from happening?

dont employees check in? don't they have a unique code with the airlines that confirms their identity on their ID card? if so then why wasn't that used in this case?

reply to post by davespanners


This guy was pretty bold to do what he did. I would think security would be tougher with airline personnel since they have more behind the scenes contact with luggage, airport facilities and the plane itself. The guy was pretty ingenious to think up the stunt, but stupid at the same time.

reply to post by ugie1028


You would think so wouldnt you! I don't know how the air crew are screened for flights so I'm not sure if this is some kind of aberration caused by people just being asleep on the job or a systemic failure of the whole air security system

I don't know about now, but several years ago, all you did was go to the airline in question, show your credentials, and they gave you a pass to ride in the cockpit (this is in the US, not sure about foreign policies such as in this situation). There were no codes, no special handshakes, or anything of the sort. If there was enough time they might call your airline and verify that you really worked for them, but that was almost an optional requirement.

reply to post by WeRpeons


To get a restricted access badge you have to go through a five year background check, involving fingerprinting. However, and here's the rub, most air crews, unless it's their home airport, don't have restricted badges. Sometimes they don't even have one for their own home airport. The badges are different for each airport so there is no commonality. Most aircrew are only required to wear the airlines identification badge on their uniform.

When they are boarding their planes, they are only required to undergo the same screening that we undergo. Pre-9/11 some airports didn't even require that. The crew would check in with the airline, the airline would pass them through a restricted door, and they were in the sterile area and headed to the plane.

reply to post by davespanners


im going to go with your theory. complete failure of their security!

they should do a complete overhaul f their system if they were fooled like this. We should hate and love the guy for doing this though. imagine if someone who had malicious intentions while impersonating a pilot? could of ended very differently.

He should still be charged though but at the same time thanked for finding this hole and by doing that, allow the airlines to patch up their security holes.

reply to post by Zaphod58


Wow. Im genuinely shocked that security is that slack, I would have thought that any loopholes like this would have been completely closed post 9/11.

Has anyone seen the movie Catch Me If You Can? Based on a true story?



Guy pretended to be pilot, doctor, lawyer, and many other things, doing just what is detailed in the OP, while forging millions of $ in fake checks, and getting away with it for years.

Frank Abagnale wiki

reply to post by davespanners


The TSA opened more holes than they closed post 9/11. Their training levels weren't even a joke, they were so bad. They were in such a rush to get them in place, so that they could say "Look! We did something to protect you!" that they didn't even bother to do more than outline their training schedule before they were being put in place.

One of the machines that I used to operate (and I was one of the better operators if I do say so myself), took me just over a month to become a qualified operator (involving three tests, any one of which if I failed I would either be disqualified or have to start over). When the TSA took over, they taught a four hour class, involving "If you see the red light come on, open the bag." They took a multimillion dollar scanner, that is one of the best in the world, and turned it into a glorified x-ray machine so that they wouldn't have to train for too long.

I won't go into details about the machines, or how they operate, but their training was severely inadequate for what they are doing.

I give the guy nine out of ten for blagging.It would have been a ten if he'd got away with it.Perhaps he's done us all a favour by exposing their security flaws.

reply to post by Druscilla


Yeah, I was thinking that! One of my most favourite films, Abagnale Jnr. was a genius...!

I have to give this guy a round of applause for his balls....

But, what if he was a suicide bomber?

Airports are now so stressful, being made to feel like a criminal just because I haven't put my perfume in a little plastic bag, having to get half undressed, shoes off, pat-downs, creepy guys going through all my personal stuff... And this guy managed to clear all security, got into the cockpit AND managed to get from Munich to Turin without being rumbled? I seriously don't get it

reply to post by paradisepurple


Flight crews aren't treated like normal passengers. They go through different procedures, so when this guy had all the proper appearing credentials, they treated him like a flight crew member, and passed him along just like any other crew member.

Great way to save on airline tickets.
Security.......what security.Guess if it was in the US they would have felt the size of his......... and stopped him.

Reading the posts. I believe there is a misconception here that all countries are like the usa. Most countries are not. They are not extremely paranoid and think their aeroplanes will be hijacked every time a person boards.

Pre 9/11 , post 9/11 , 9/11 is an usa thing for the most part ( with exception to maybe a handful of other countries) and most countries in the world don't care about it.

This flight was from germany to italy, no where near the usa. The laws regarding this are adequate and no this occurrence not cause enough for alarm that there is need to have usa american tsa style security implemented at all aeroports around they world.

reply to post by emberscott


A lot of other countries already had TSA or stronger security in place pre-9/11. But all security has holes, no matter where you are, and no matter how hard you try to plug them. Just that here in the US, the TSA has created holes you could drive a semi through.

reply to post by Zaphod58


Name and shame. I would like to read this.

reply to post by emberscott


The example cited above is about as far as I'll say about it. I try hard not to go into much detail about when I worked at the airport when it comes to procedures, and equipment. Suffice it to say that it's all pretty similar to the above.

The one other example that I will cite is the L3 Examiner fiasco. Most airports used the GE Invision CTX5500 Explosive Detection System to screen checked bags (the huge machines that were in the lobbies when you checked in). Around 2000 or so, L3 was trying to break into the market with the Examiner EDS. When the FAA IG tested the different EDS systems (there were three at the time), the only one that was deemed acceptable and beat the standards was the CTX, the L3 and the other system (which truly was a complete POS and had all kinds of problems every time you turned it on), were deemed substandard, and the FAA was told not to buy them.

Well, along comes Tom Daschle. His wife (are you sitting down for this one, because I'm sure you won't see this coming), was a lobbyist for L3 Communications, and went to him about this situation. Well, surprise surprise, when the new budget was passed, the FAA was told that they would buy the Examiner, or they would lose funding for that year. So instead of having a lot of really good CTX systems, we ended up with a bunch of systems that even the FAA said were substandard (which is saying a lot when you're talking about that organization).