With officials now saying the attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon relied on terrorist pilots, possibly from overseas and trained in the United States, investigators are examining the role that may have been played by flight schools.

That comes as little surprise to aviation instructors, who acknowledge that U.S. flight schools draw scores of students from overseas, in some cases actively recruiting them. The main requirement for entry, they say, is the ability to pay.

''It's accessible to everybody as long as you have money in your pocket,'' said Victor Richard, a flight instructor-in-training at Alpha Tango Flying School in San Antonio.

At Alpha Tango, students from Mexico, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and Germany study to become pilots. For about $5,000, they can earn the right to fly single-engine private planes.

There are hundreds of such schools nationwide, though only about two dozen offer training in how to fly the large jets involved in Tuesday's attack.

But for a student who wants to fly smaller craft, and even for those with dreams of piloting the biggest jets, the United States is the place to come. It is far cheaper here to get such training and experience than in most countries, educators say, an advantage that starts with the fact that jet fuel is so much less expensive than it is elsewhere.

''There are a fair number of flight schools in Florida and Arizona that are attractive for foreigners learning to fly because the weather is benign, which means you get lots of chances to fly, the cost of living is relatively low and it's much cheaper to learn to fly,'' said William Shumann, a spokesman for the Federal Aviation Adminstriaton.

It is also relatively easy to get in. Most flight schools offer paperwork for M category visas through the mail to prospective students, essentially offering them a spot on the roster. For students from countries like Canada, that is enough to cross a border point, said Richard Kaylor, manager of Richmor Aviation, a Hudson, N.Y., flight school.

Students from other countries must go to U.S. consulates overseas and get permission to travel to the United States. In 1998, the most recent year for which figures are available, the State Department granted 6,972 M visas, which are used for all vocational education, including flight training.

Flight school operators said experience has shown the process to be quite easy for prospective students to obtain such visas. Others just show up and enroll, often without being questioned by flight schools, Kaylor said.

''It's not very difficult for someone to come here,'' he said. ''Technically, when they walk in the door, and say they want to fly, we teach them to fly. It's not really our job to see if they're here legally or illegally.''

Investigators may recall that they have heard a similar story before.

Three men convicted in 1996 in an unsuccessful plot to blow up 11 American airliners included a Kuwaiti named Abdul Hakim Murad, who trained as a pilot at four American flight schools, including Richmor and Alpha Tango. One of his accomplices was the man convicted of masterminding the 1993 World Trade Center bombing; he allegedly had ties to terrorism financier Osama bin Laden.

One of the prosecutors in that case, Dietrich Snell, said Tuesday there was no indication that Hakim's flight skills were key to the plot. But he noted that the same group had a subplot, never fully developed, to obtain a plane and crash it into the Pentagon.

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