Details of a gun fired on a flight from Denver Saturday morning began to emerge today.
Federal regulators confirmed that the pilot accidentally fired the gun in the cockpit and the bullet exited the plane just beneath a window as the US Airways jet approached its landing in Charlotte just before noon.
“We’re just not able yet to get into exactly what occurred, how the gun was handled, before it went off,” said Greg Alter, spokesman for the Federal Marshal Service, one of the agencies investigating the incident. “It’s just premature to speculate.”
Alter said gun did not fire on its own. The pilot, who has not been identified, is cooperating with the investigation, he said.
US Airways confirmed that the pilot had been taken off flight duty.
The pilot was in the left seat of the cockpit and the bullet went through the hull on his side of the plane, just beneath the window.
The pistol was identified Monday as a .40 caliber semiautomatic Heckler & Koch USP, 28-ounce German-made handgun. Alter would not speculate on the duration of the investigation, but said “it should be in short order.”
“The most important thing is to make sure this never happens again,” he said.
Spokespeople for the government and the airline have declined to speculate on what sanctions, if any, or changes in procedure might result from the investigation.
Alter said the pilot had been suspended from a federal program that allows pilots and crew to be armed.
Agencies involved in the investigation have said the aircraft was never in danger, but some aviation sources disagree
“The hole from the bullet wouldn’t bring down a plane by itself, but it can put in motion a lot of bad things that could lead instruments to fail or pilots to become wounded,” said engineering contractor John Thomas of Littleton, who has designed airplanes for combat duty.
“I would not say they were never in danger. I would say US Airways, the pilot and all the people on that flight were lucky.”
Charles Lien of Denver, a retired electrical engineer who specialized in the design of power systems for military and commercial aircraft, agreed.
“I do not pretend to be an expert, but I know that the most vulnerable portion of the cockpit in a commercial aircraft are the windows, particularly the windscreen,” he said. “If the shot had penetrated the window, it would have compromised the window’s mechanical integrity. This could have caused the window to collapse and subject the cockpit to explosive decompression.”
The incident is believed to be the first gunfire in flight since security measures were broadened to allow pilots to carry weapons in the aftermath of 9/11.
The plan, an Airbus A319, also has been grounded during the investigation, said Federal Aviation Administration spokesman Mike Fergus.
The plane is being thoroughly checked, he said, to make sure none of the instrumentation or hydraulics had been compromised.
The Associated Press obtained photographs Monday of the the plane, showing the bullet’s entry into the cockpit wall and its exit beneath a window.
US Airways spokesman Morgan Durrant said the photographs did not come from the airline.
Flight 1536 left Denver at 6:45 a.m. Saturday with 124 passengers, two pilots and three flight attendants, records showed.
Joey Bunch: 303-954-1174 or jbunch@denverpost.com
