When the Skies Are Too Dangerous to Fly

Following a rocket attack that landed only a mile from Ben Gurion airport in Tel Aviv yesterday, the Federal Aviation Administration announced that no U.S. flights would be allowed to fly to Israel for a period of 24 hours.

The announcement came less than a week after a Malaysia Airlines flight carrying 298 passengers was shot out of the sky over a conflict zone in Ukraine, prompting some to question why commercial airlines were still flying over war zones at all.

The flight restrictions in Israel begs the question: What happens when the airspace becomes a war zone? 

Jim Fallows is National Correspondent for the Atlantic, an instrument-rated pilot, and the author of "China Airborne." He weighs in on the dangers in the sky, and how the aviation industry can prepare or react in these circumstances.

While the question of safe skies remains up in the air, a slow investigation into the destruction of MH17 has begun. The Russian government continues to deny that it may have provided separatists in Ukraine with the surface-to-air missiles U.S. officials say shot down the plane.

But the State Department says it can list exactly what arms the separatists have.

Stephen Biddle, a professor of political science at George Washington University and an adjunct senior fellow for Defense Policy at the Council on Foreign Relations, explains what kinds of high-end weaponry the pro-Russian separatists in Ukraine might have, what can they do, and what it takes to operate them.