TSA Wants You To Keep Your Seat, and Your Hands In Sight 888
An anonymous reader excerpts from an AP story as carried by Yahoo News about changes stemming from yesterday's foiled bombing attempt of a Northwest Airlines flight: "Some airlines were telling passengers on Saturday that new government security regulations prohibit them from leaving their seats beginning an hour before landing. The regulations are a response to a suspected terrorism incident on Christmas Day. Air Canada said in a statement that new rules imposed by the Transportation Security Administration limit on-board activities by passengers and crew in US airspace. ... Flight attendants on some domestic flights are informing passengers of similar rules. Passengers on a flight from New York to Tampa Saturday morning were also told they must remain in their seats and couldn't have items in their laps, including laptops and pillows." The TSA's list of prohibited items doesn't seem to have changed in the last day, though.
My Theory (Score:5, Interesting)
I am starting to think the airlines want this.
If government rules make it impossible to have comfortable flight, why should an airline even try to make the flight comfortable?
(fedex can ship 200 pounds of meat cheaper than american airlines)*
*might not actually be true, but I am sure some bean counter is thinking it
Re:NO! (Score:4, Interesting)
In fact, the only person who seems to have left his seat is the guy who got up to stop the attack. So, should he have remained seated instead?
Re:This makes perfect sense (Score:5, Interesting)
To keep the rule makers employed.
"On every second Tuesday, you will strap a sausage to your nose, hope on one foot and shout 'I am a pretty wittle princess!'"
"But why? How will this rule solve anything?"
"Silence! Are you on the side of the drug smugglers/pedophiles/terrorists! Submit to us, and demonstrate it by quacking like a duck."
Enough of this shit already (Score:5, Interesting)
Number of people dead from car accidents this year: tens of thousands
Number of people dead from cancer this year: hundreds of thousands
Number of people inconvenienced because of stupid airline regulations: millions
Number of people losing their livelihood due to reduced tourism to the USA: probably tens of thousands
Number of people dieing as an indirect cause of airline regulations: probably more than the victims of terrorism this year
Number of people failing to comprehend basic statistics: hundreds of millions
Seriously, enough of this madness. It was a foiled bombing attempt that came with the usual Al Quaeda franchise branding. I certainly don't care about the original news more than a few brief lines about it on some buried page on the BBC's website, however it's pissing me off in a major way that a lot of people seem to think this is a big deal. It's not!
Just take a train. (Score:1, Interesting)
Trains may take longer but you can walk around and see the country side. No lines and relax and talk with those around you.
Oh and you can use you cell phone.
Re:Oh, look! (Score:5, Interesting)
I agree, lets maintain some perspective.
almost 2 people die every second in the world.
over 100 people die every minute in the world.
That's 6000 every hour. 144000 every day. 1008000 every week. 52416000 every year.
9/11 didn't even have the power to change the average for a year.
lets continue to put things in 'perspective'
over 4 babies are born each second. 5760 born per day.
by the time it was 9/12, every person who died there, was replaced.
you are a drop of water in an ocean. you are insignificant.
no matter how much you tell yourself that 'thousands' of dead is important, it simply isn't.
Re:10,000,000+ U.S. commerical flights annually... (Score:3, Interesting)
Has anybody provided any evidence that the guy had anything remotely like a bomb?
From this article: [bbc.co.uk]
High explosives are believed to have been moulded to his body and sewn in to his underpants. ...
A preliminary FBI analysis has found that the device allegedly found on Mr Abdulmutallab contained the high explosive PETN, also known as pentaerythritol.
It sounds pretty full on to me. I think we dodged a bullet.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pentaerythritol [wikipedia.org]
Derivatives of pentaerythritol are components of alkyd resins, varnishes, PVC stabilizers, tall oil esters, and olefin antioxidants.
Or he could have had a HEAVY tan after he put on the pants?
Re:Oh, look! (Score:5, Interesting)
Indeed. It's the streisand effect of terrorism... 9/11 could have been at most a minor annoyance but instead it became the rallying cry for numerous restrictions on freedom with questionable results at best.
Not only that, but it's become a rather strong rallying cry in support of General Aviation - you know, private planes and all?
As a member of a flight club, I can fly a private Cessna 182 at 150 MPH (pretty much) anytime I want, at a cost that's perhaps 25% higher than driving. Typically, private planes get me there in somewhere between 25% and 33% the time to drive, and for trips between 100 and 750 miles is a very competitive way to go.
1) I don't land at big airports, I land at small ones that exist in nearly every community over 5,000 to 10,000 people or so. At these airports, delays really don't exist. There are usually not more than 2 or 3 other planes active at any given time, often none.
2) Small airports almost inevitably put me very close to where I want to go, anyway! Rather than drive 1.5 hours after landing, I get a taxi for the 3-5 mile ride.
3) Stupid security restrictions? Naw - back the car up to the side of the plane and throw your bags aboard! At larger airports, there are often security fences and the like, but even these are easily navigated, certainly without the stupid wands, shoes, and security theater.
The only real limit in going this way is weather - as a visual-only pilot, I'm grounded when the clouds get too low. (But even that won't be a limit for much longer)
Re:How about not allowing direct flight from Niger (Score:5, Interesting)
Make every passenger from Nigeria go out through security in Amsterdam, then back in.
Amsterdam already does this, not just for Nigeria, but for every passenger arriving from every country.
You have clearly never been to the Amsterdam airport. The security checkpoints in Amsterdam are at the departure gates, not at the terminal entrance. Every single departure gate has an individual security checkpoint, with metal detector and x-ray machine. Every passenger boarding the flight is screened, regardless of their point of origin.
My first reaction upon seeing this setup was that it was a waste of resources for every gate to have a separate checkpoint. But it makes sense in a lot of ways. It prevents long lines from building up in any single checkpoint (important if you're concerned about terrorists setting off bombs while waiting in a densely packed line). Also, unlike US airports, if a passenger escapes through the checkpoint, it's very easy to find him afterward, since there's nowhere to go beyond the checkpoint except onto the plane. Hence you never see the entire airport closing down because one passenger ran through the checkpoint the wrong way. My guess is that the cost saved by avoiding 2-3 security related airport closures in this way makes up for the cost of the extra hardware.
Re:Oh, look! (Score:5, Interesting)
How about the lives of all the innocent people caught in the crossfire in Iraq and Afghanistan? Over 100,000 people dead. Are those 3,000 that died on 9/11 worthless? Of course not. However, the cost of the ensuing wars were clearly not worth it. If we tackled any other causes of death in a similar fashion, we'd have a very very large bloodbath on our hands. Decisions need to be made in a calm, rational manner. This is extremely difficult if not impossible to do if emotions are allowed to take over. Which is why people need to step back from the situation away from the stron emotions involved in order to make the right decision.
Re:One hour? Seriously? (Score:5, Interesting)
Elsewhere in the world the focus is steadily shifting to protecting of IT resources both in the air and on the ground for flight operations and administration, ensuring Business Continuity and Recovery Plans are up to code and auditing processes are proper and functioning and yet in the US they can't even handle the basic preventative measures during the screening process and even terminal logistics. I went to LAX last year and I saw regular breaches of baggage quarantine, lack of functioning access control mechanisms allowing access to restricted airside operations and various other absurdities. Now I'm sure some fool here is going to yell "Don't give the terrorists ideas!", unless these terrorists are blind in both eyes these problems are immediately apparent and those in charge of devising policy consistently ignore the experts advising them not only about these issues but what treatments are available. What are people like me to do? In the US people like me are ignored when we take the proper routes and if we go public we are immediately shunned and treated like criminals for "exposing weaknesses and threatening national security". The whole thing is a joke and in my experience the current state of the saga which is called "aviation security" originates in the US.
Re:10,000,000+ U.S. commerical flights annually... (Score:3, Interesting)
PETN is pentaerythritol tetranitrate [wikipedia.org] which is most decidedly not found in varnish. It's a nitrate ester of pentaerythritol and is actually quite a powerful explosive.
Re:How about not allowing direct flight from Niger (Score:5, Interesting)
Alternatives (Score:1, Interesting)
My wife wants to see the USA someday. I don't see this happening any more. At the very least, we are taking the BOAT. I don't care if it takes weeks to get there. At least I do not need to go through all this "security" bullshit. Wake up and smell the coffee. TERRORISTS WIN
FYI I live in Israel and jet fighters fly over my house 3-5 times a week. Just now one passed over my house at mach 1+, shaking the coffee cup on my desk during one of their flyby's to Lebanon. Sure its noisy but unlike TSA, the Israel Army is not treating me as a terrorist! (And I get to pay reduced taxes)
Re:OK, this is stupid. (re: Israel) (Score:5, Interesting)
I've been to Israel only once -- earlier this year; beautiful and interesting place to visit! -- and while I agree with you that their procedures seemed more humane, I wouldn't say that they (speaking only of the visible parts) were any less visible / overt than in the U.S., but rather the opposite.
My demographic (perhaps the same as yours, I don't know) I'm sure contributed to the scrutiny I received on both sides of my 3-week trip -- I didn't *notice* any extra attention paid to me during my actual time in the country, which doesn't prove there wasn't any. (That is, as male under 40, traveling alone with no checked baggage, and no strong connections to Israel in the form of family, culture, previous visits, etc.)
I was approached and questioned (not unpleasant -- agent was cute) even on arrival, right on the stairs leading from the plane to the hallway to the main terminal, who called me out by name. Was it partly because I was taking the stairs (two at a time) instead of the escalator, or blind chance? I dunno. All visitors (there are separate lines for Israeli passport holders, and I'm not sure how they're treated) on arrival must clear passport control with a small interview about the purpose of the visit, schedule, etc. I have visited a handful of countries overall (8, I think), but it was by far the most thoroughly and frankly I ever remember being examined. Very different from most of my experiences with TSA in the US, and seemed to be more thoughtful / alert even than what I found in German and American airports when I flew to Berlin from the U.S. in October, 2001 -- a pretty tense time to fly.
On departure from Israel, was engaged in pointed conversation by three different security people in the initial line at the airport, too, before even checking in for my flight, and that's before I reached the two X-ray stations, pat-down station, and chemical sniffer. Asked to spell the names, and give the address, of the friends with whom I had stayed in Jerusalem, to name and describe the place I'd stayed in Haifa, to describe in detail (more than once) the purpose of my trip, my itinerary, etc, and prompted to agree -- again, more than once -- that perhaps someone had supplied me with a package to carry on my flight, etc. "No, this is all my own luggage, and I have had control of it the whole time. Yes, I packed it. Correct, this is my luggage for the entire trip. Yes, I visited Jordan for one day, to visit Petra. No, I don't know anyone in Jordan. Yes, I met some interesting people while I've been in Israel, but No, none of them asked me to carry anything in my luggage. I was in Haifa to give a small talk and to see the city." (etc.) Thought it was a bit much even given my expectations of hard-nosed vigilance, it was all fairly polite and respectful* -- just insistent. It also buoyed my confidence that people who seemed competent and thoughtful were visibly involved, and actually enjoyed it as an interesting cultural experience. If I flew there every month, I might feel a lot differently about it.
This is not to say that I am aware of all the security stuff going on in the background, there or in the U.S. -- I figure (and hope) that there's more to it than what I see ;)
Cheers,
timothy
* This is certainly not my experience with TSA, though I'm sure some of their agents are competent, polite, and alert. I've just seen, or at least taken note of, more of the other kind. My horror stories aren't even campfire ghost stories compared to the people who've really gotten screwed over by TSA, and so aren't worth recounting at this time of night, so I'll just leave it at that.
Land of the free, home of the brave? (Score:1, Interesting)
Such a shame, I travel frequently to the US, know lots of Americans, all intelligent nice people. Yet the government forces them to live in fear, when in reality there is next to none. And the impositions forced on them, and anyone else in the world, simply do not work.
What really gets my riled up, is to get on a plane to the US, I've got to go through TWO security check points, the regular one, and an extra one where 'they' (TSA) block off half the terminal and proceed to further slow and annoy (they do pat downs). And it doesn't work. On my most recent trip, I unknowingly made it all the way into the US with a pocket knife in my carry on (I removed the regular one, I'd forgotten about the little one).
Enjoy your eroded freedom, and illusion of safety Americans. Me, I enjoy coming home. Only have to worry about our government forcibly protecting us from boobies on the interwebs.
The terrorists have won.
Re:NO! (Score:5, Interesting)
Once in a while I get an awful urge to find a toilet really quickly. Waiting an hour to use a restroom might cause a lot of people to lose their lunch from the stink of what might occur.
Frankly we have gone insane. At the price of our current wars against terror we might be better off to let the loonies pick a large American building and two large passenger jest to blow up every year. We would save money for sure compared to the cost of using our military.
Or we could cut lose and use the big weapons and see if any survivors still want to fight.
Re:Oh, look! (Score:4, Interesting)
BUT... What about all of those people that died in Spain? Or how about the ones in London? Have the Europeans decided to lock down all of their train stations and require body cavity searches?
Those people lost lives as much as anybody else, yet all we remember is 9/11. All we talk about is 9/11.
You don't actually expect the US to take notice, or care, of what happens in the "here be dragons"* areas of the world, do you ?
(*) as seen by a large portion of its population
Having in mind of those TSA restrictions (Score:3, Interesting)
Is it possible to travel to USA from Europe by ship? Is there any passenger lines? Or cargo ships which accepts passengers?
Re:Oh, look! (Score:1, Interesting)
Thousands of people dying cannot reasonably be described as a "minor annoyance."
Yeah, but remember we're talking about thousands of *Americans* dying. To a large portion of the /. crowd and the self-hating, self-guilt-stricken liberals/progressives (and the two sets overlap significantly) that *was* only a minor annoyance, and that mostly because of the air travel hassles this caused everyone, not because American civilians died horrible deaths at the hands of suicidal murdering cowards.
If Freud were still alive, he'd have a field-day reading /. posts.
Strat
Re:Oh, look! (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Oh, look! (Score:4, Interesting)
4000 people died under the terror campaign by the IRA in Ireland - supported by most in the US.
And funded, to a large degree, by the good people of New York City. One of the benefits of the 9/11 attacks was that Giuliani suddenly decided terrorism wasn't cool anymore and the IRA, seeing its major source of funds dry up, became a lot more willing to negotiate.
Re:My Theory (Score:3, Interesting)
If government rules make it impossible to have comfortable flight, why should an airline even try to make the flight comfortable?
Ryanair has already taken this security mindset to its logical conclusion:
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2006/08/22/ryanair_security/print.html [theregister.co.uk]
Re:Oh, look! (Score:4, Interesting)
No, not 'self-hating, self-guilt-stricken liberals/progressives,' people with a sense of perspective. If you're a nationalist and believe that only American lives are important then let's compare it to traffic accidents. 42,196 people died in the USA in road traffic accidents in 2001. In September 2001, more people died in car crashes than died in terrorist attacks.
2,973 people dying is a tragedy, but it's not a statistically significant tragedy and it's far less of a tragedy than the much larger number of people who die from entirely preventable traffic accidents caused by idiots texting while driving or driving while intoxicated.
By the way, you're now up to around 5,000 American deaths in Iraq and Afghanistan (not counting other coalition forces, civilians or 'the bad guys'). So the War on Terror has cost more American lives so far than the 9/11 attacks. Good job guys!
Re:Oh, look! (Score:3, Interesting)
That happened long before 9/11 -- it was officially a response to Irish republican terrorism
To American funded Irish republican terrorism. The bins were removed after Warrington in 1993 -- where American funded Irish republican terrorists blew up a bin in a town centre, outside a McDonalds, the day before mothers day. Then when people were fleeing away, blew another bomb up in the direction they were fleeing. American funded Irish republican terrorists murdered two innocent children on that day.
One of the boys fathers, Colin Parry, later shook hands with Gerry Adams. It'd be like a 9/11 victim shaking hands with Osama bin Laden.
Re:NO! (Score:3, Interesting)
I think the real question is what could a terrorist do to make an Amtrak train any more dangerous than it already is.
Re:NO! (Score:0, Interesting)
It's actually hideously simple to stop trampling your own citizens rights if you are the USA:
1. Wait for a terrorist attack.
2. Find the perpetrators origin.
3. Drop a single 30t bomb onto their capital.
4. Warn that country that the next attack will ensure their infrastructure gets bombed back into the stone age.
5. Publish the results widely, as a warning. The big ol' effin' crater won't cause too many human victims, but serve as a graphic warning.
If terrorists from that nation strike a secobd time, send all of their electronics back to the stone age using a small nuke with NEMP effect.
It's maybe not the nice way to do it, but for real terrorists that think that killing women because they spoiled their family's honor, or sending ten year old kids with an explosive beld to blow up a few infidels, it's the only way they will understand, or at least their community will, and thus denounce the plans of such scumbags to the US in order to avoid getting hit a second time by an air force that is basically untouchable for them.
Re:NO! (Score:1, Interesting)
It's the fact that a superpower has been conducting covert terrorist actions against his people for decades and there's no 'fair'-/direct-military- means for them to seek redress.
Yep, ask your government to stop committing acts of terrorism and ensure that the media start to give coverage to american-sponsored atrocities so that the people will apply more pressure to have this terrorism stopped.
Re:Oh, look! (Score:4, Interesting)
So let's look at a couple hypothetical situations and you tell me if the actors involved are innocent.
Scenario 1: Big Country is waging war on Little Country. Big Countrians are paying taxes so that Big Country's military can afford munitions to use in said war. In said war some civilians are killed on both sides. Are Big Countrians innocent? They do pay money so said war is possible.
Scenario 2: Small Country has a few camps that are used by some people to wage war against Big Country. The people in those camps aren't militarily involved with Small Country but the government of Small Country allows them to be there. One of the camps is located by Small Town. Small Town has commerce with one of the camps. They supply food, basic materials for training (hey you think paper targets are free?), and other minor issues. Are the people of Small Town innocent? They provide some degree of support that makes the operation of the camp possible.
In my experience, there's one dude who I could call innocent in the current hostilities of his time: Henry David Thoreau. He all refused to pay taxes (not one penny) for the war of his time and promptly went to jail. He didn't think the war was a good idea and didn't want to do anything with it so he didn't do anything with it.
Re:Having in mind of those TSA restrictions (Score:3, Interesting)
Is it possible to travel to USA from Europe by ship?
The Queen Mary II [cunard.com] crosses the Atlantic in 7 days. (It only took four days in the heyday of transatlantic liners.) List price starts at $907.00, and big discounts are available. Includes movie theater, live theater, disco, hot tubs, video arcade, basketball court, swimming pools, tennis court, laundromats, casino, cell phone service, WiFi, an Internet center, and a library. Eastbound sailing dates for 2010 are Apr 29, May 21, Jun 07, Jul 06, Jul 19, Sep 12.
The one thing they don't have is single cabins.
Re:Oh, look! (Score:3, Interesting)
You can get something of a traffic jam on rare occasions, usually when certain airports are closed by temporary flight restrictions (TFR). I flew into Palomar Airport a few months ago during the Miramar Air Show, and the pilots that normally would have flown into Montgomery, Gillespie, and maybe Ramona (all reasonably-populated airports) were basically having to use Palomar. When I touched down, there were at least five other aircraft in the pattern, and several others in the vicinity of the airport either inbound or outbound. Tower gets a little hectic at that time.
As for speed -- absolutely. I can get just about anywhere beyond the 30-mile marker faster by plane than by car (preflight can take a few minutes). A trip to Las Vegas from my home is about a four-hour drive, and that's presuming there's no traffic, such as there is on holiday weekends or certain major events, when it can take twice that long to get home. By plane, it's under two hours in a Cessna 172, and under 90 minutes in a Cessna 182, pretty much any time. From where I fly, that's about $600 rental for either the 172 ($150/hr) or the 182 ($200/hr), looking at a round trip. It's a decent deal on holiday weekends: Four people go out at $150 each on a weekend trip, skipping the major airport tedium and getting stuck in traffic. And if we want, we can do a little sight-seeing along the way, something that's much harder to do in a car.
Re:Oh, look! (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:NO! (Score:3, Interesting)
But you, sir, are criticizing one who is opposed to religious extremists, and in so doing are aiding and comforting such extremists. That is indefensible.
The GP is right: worshiping a murdering, psychopathic deity is stupid.
Then again, I would call any religious worship (of belief or non-belief in a deity) an act of psychopathy. The world would be a better place without religion of any kind; without Christianity, without Buddhism, without Islam, without Jainism, without (even) Atheism, and so forth. The dissolution of belief and non-belief in the existence of the unprovable would do us all incalculable good.
Re:Of course they're listed. (Score:3, Interesting)