Airline Installs Cameras On Its Planes

Well, you knew it was coming. In these days of reinforced cockpit doors and puffer-sniffer portals in the terminal, you knew eventually that Big Brother would be watching you.

On Sun Country, he is.

The Minnesota-based LCC is one of the first airlines to install cabin-monitoring cameras in its 737-800s and you can bet, with an FAA mandate behind it, that's going to be a popular trend in the coming years. After all, as Sun Country's director of safety and security, Tony Loeks, puts it, "A door doesn't do you much good (for protection) if the crew has to open it." Loeks was quoted in the Minneapolis/St. Paul Business Journal.

The airline used a $230,000 FAA grant to test both wired and wireless camera systems.

But while the mandate is there and the technology seems capable, the one thing missing from the equation appears to be dollars. Greenbacks. Moola.

"Typically the major carriers are trying to stay out of bankruptcy, so they're not going to spend money on this," Sun Country operations engineer T.J. Horsager told the Business Journal. "I think the FAA will look at that and analyze when the right time is to do that. The European airlines are being mandated now, so it's not a question of if, but when."

FMI: www.suncountry.com/suncountry