So there she sits on the tarmac, my beautiful 737-700, and it's a cold, dark, morning. I walk out there... and no stairs, the door is closed... and I'm 6ft below the door handle....Seriously, folks, in this situation how do you get in to be able to start the cold, dark, cockpit process? How do you get the steps down and the door opened? I'm talking reality, here.Just curious! - Pete

extend the airstairs if they are installed (access door below and aft of fwd entry door )switches inside enable operation of the airstairs externally, or push an entry stand up to the plane.

OK, Wallace, thanks! That's part 1: stairs are down. Door is still shut. I assume locked. Where's my key?

Ain't no key!!oliver.sinnaeve

Key? for the entry door, look under the welcome mat:)

No its not under the welcome mat, everyone knows the NG doesn't have a welcome mat option!It is inside the fake rock magnet stuck to the bottom of the left wing!:-lol :-lolGeorge

"extend the airstairs if they are installed (access door below and aft of fwd entry door )switches inside enable operation of the airstairs externally...."This might be a little difficult on a dead ship, Wallace... or are the stairs wired up to the (Unswitched) Hot Battery Bus??? ;-)(No need to answer this one.... I don't want another 911 incident on my conscience, thanks ;-) I think I already know the answer... Something to do with the acronym "GHB", perhaps?Cheers.Ian.

"Ain't no key!!"Thankfully, though... there is a cockpit door key to keep out unwelcome guests ;-)Cheers.Ian.

Thanks to all. I'm surprised Ian doesn't know the answer (or isn't telling)... Yes, I appreciate the '911' concerns and I thought for a long time before posing the original question. But it kept nagging me so I decided to ask. And I made the question about the 'key' into a joke. Key?? Ha!!Let me re-pose my original question in a different way. When we read how to start from the 'cold dark cockpit' the first action is usually to turn on the battery switch. I assume that, however, the ship is not totally 'dead' until this is done - it must be possible to do things like: extend airstairs, open cargo area and switch lights on. Is this the 'hot battery bus' that's been mentioned? What operations does it permit?And finally why, in the default start-up and in Timothy Metzinger's excellent tutorial, is the cold, dark, cockpit set up with the eng. hydraulic pump switches left on? What happens if you lock up the plane last thing at night with them switched off?- Pete

"When we read how to start from the 'cold dark cockpit' the first action is usually to turn on the battery switch. I assume that, however, the ship is not totally 'dead' until this is done - it must be possible to do things like: extend airstairs, open cargo area and switch lights on. Is this the 'hot battery bus' that's been mentioned? What operations does it permit?"Hi, Pete.Probably the pieces of the jigsaw puzzle are already there for the terrorists to figure out how to hijack a dead ship, so I may have been overly cautious. I didn't know about the external switches for the airstairs, perhaps because I haven't been trained on the 737... I just see people's questions on the forum and then go away and research the answers... I have plenty of resources available to me. To be honest, I don't even know if our own airline has the airstairs option! (I've certainly never seen them being used...nor has there been any need to use them at the airport where I work).What I can probably let you know is that the Hot Battery Bus will most likely not be used for something like this. The Hot Battery Bus is only used for very low current DC applications (like keeping the Chronometer internals running... not even the chronometer digital LCD display!). We're talking milliamps here, if not microamps. A much more powerful source of AC power must be used for things like cargo doors and other high current applications like airstairs.... so that's one more hurdle the terrorist will have to overcome ;-)Amyway, I'm sure you'll find your answer eventually, if not today.Cheers.Ian.

Pete ,the Eng Hyd pump switch's are always left in the on position to prolong shutoff valve solenoid life. Solenoid valves are energized off. Also helps prolong eng pump life if engines are wind milling due to winds.

Hey Ian, remember, these (um, can't really find a name i can type here) types got formal training on how to fly from commercial flight training schools.When professional schools are willing to train folks for their ATP tickets, there is really no way on earth to fault the sim (game) world although various brainless news agencies jumped on the bandwagon having nothing better to do then to increase the witch hunt.Bottom line, cockpits should be sealed before takeoff. The fact that this was never done is just blind faith in humankind as a race and we obviously fall short in that catagory.People will always find some justification and methodology to kill other people, it's just the way the we are as a species. Sad but true...Ray