TSA Reminds You Not To Travel With Hand Grenades 378
coondoggie writes "Some of the travel recommendations posted on the Transportation Security Administration's blog seem stupefying obvious. This week's, entitled: 'Leave Your Grenades at Home' seemed like a no brainer, but alas. The TSA wrote about grenades in particular: Year to date, the agency's officers have discovered: 43 grenades in carry-on baggage and 40 grenades in checked baggage."
wait...even the Holy ones? (Score:5, Funny)
wait...even the Holy ones?
What about the foam ones? or the ones that are really balloons (but not filled up with anything yet)?
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Re:wait...even the Holy ones? (Score:4, Interesting)
Obligatory movie quote:
Cleric: "And the Lord spake, saying, "First shalt thou take out the Holy Pin. Then, shalt thou count to three. No more. No less. Three shalt be the number thou shalt count, and the number of the counting shall be three. Four shalt thou not count, neither count thou two, excepting that thou then proceed to three. Five is right out. Once at the number three, being the third number to be reached, then, lobbest thou thy Holy Hand Grenade of Antioch towards thy foe, who, being naughty in My sight, shall snuff it."
On topic, I'd like to see a phone app along somewhat similar lines to ride-sharing and flight-booking combined, only with private charter flight services, to coordinate people traveling to/from the same or near-enough locations to share costs and save money and time, not to mention one's civil rights.
The more popular it becomes the more flight volume for the charter services in frequency and flights seated to capacity, and therefor charter services whose aircraft are in the air with full seats earning money steadily and reliably have the ability to negotiate larger bulk fuel contracts, tires, engines and other parts, etc etc at lower costs. All those lower average costs plus competition will tend to lower passenger fees.
Heh, instead of a "flash-mob", one could have a "flash-flight", minus the groping! Groups of otherwise unrelated individuals from random backgrounds suddenly booking a charter flight together as a group might throw some wrenches into TLA surveillance/data algorithms.
You could choose the flight that irradiates, strip-searches, and cavity-searches all passengers, or choose an "open-carry" flight, smoking, non-smoking...whatever.
Wouldn't it be nice, since this is supposed to be the "land of the free" and all, to have a choice!?!?
Strat
For those of you that don't RTFA... (Score:5, Informative)
a majority of the confiscated grenades are fake, replicas or otherwise inert.
Re:For those of you that don't RTFA... (Score:5, Insightful)
A majority, but not all.
Of course, once in the air, circumstances may arise where the only way to tell is to see if it will go off. Not many people want to do that.
Hijacking using bombs, or a threat of a bomb (what's a fake?), was a popular pastime in the 1960s-70s.
Re:For those of you that don't RTFA... (Score:5, Informative)
And yet, it still then didn't add up to a statistically significant enough threat to bother with additional security.
Simple.... all those grenades....0 of them in the hands of terrorists. That should tell you this is a stupid issue.
Re:For those of you that don't RTFA... (Score:5, Interesting)
Simple.... all those grenades....0 of them in the hands of terrorists. That should tell you this is a stupid issue.
Because no terrorist would want to bring a grenade on a plane?
If the existing security is finding the grenades they don't need additional security.
Re:For those of you that don't RTFA... (Score:5, Insightful)
Because terrorists are so rare that they are not even worth worrying about, and never were.
Re:For those of you that don't RTFA... (Score:5, Insightful)
Plane hijackings and bombings are so notable because they're so exceedingly rare. I think in the entire history of flight the total number of documented cases is under 100. Worldwide.
Hyping up a climate of fear over something that's less than a rounding error isn't productive, but I congratulate you on your patriotism.
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You should continue your research to determine what the trend was before and after they starting taking more serious security measures. A raw count isn't going to do that. I think it is likely that you will find some inflection points as various nations took more effective airport security measures, usually as a result of an incident, or a string of incidents.
I'm not interested in a "climate of fear." I'm interested in keeping the incidents of terrorism & hijackings under reasonable control which is
Re:For those of you that don't RTFA... (Score:5, Insightful)
If you want to see what a country looks like where it isn't under control, think back a few years to Iraq.
Picking a country essentially in the midst of a civil war is naturally going to paint an unrealistic picture. If you want a picture of how big a threat terrorism is to the average American air traveler without all the extra security precautions we added after 9/11/2001, look at the average number of deaths per year caused by it up until those additional measures were implemented. If you want to talk about terrorism in general, leave out the "air travelers" part. Even if you just look at the stats for 2001 alone, a banner year for terrorism in the US, it was a less serious cause for concern than a lack of rubber mats in bathrooms. Anything that kills people is something we ought to look at reducing, the question is how do we prioritize our resources to most effectively save the most people without wasting inordinate amounts of money on problems that don't warrant that level of expenditure when more serious problems could use the money more effectively to save more people.
I'm interested in keeping the incidents of terrorism & hijackings under reasonable control which is a rational goal.
Good. And the person you're replying to is pointing out that the problem is under reasonable control and always has been. You can cite all the examples of successful attacks you like, the facts are that it all adds up to an actual problem of significantly smaller proportion that a few hundred other potential causes of loss of life or injury that we spend far, far less time and money worrying about today. To pretend otherwise is fear-mongering.
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Lol the trend! The trend here is easy to see.... the trend is people not blowing up planes or hijacking them...that is, and always was the overwhelmin
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The actual trend is that there have been significant changes in the rates of hijacking, and you apparently don't know what the hell you're talking about.
The Contagiousness of Aircraft Hijacking [ucf.edu]
In the mid-1960s there were only a handful of hijacking attempts, including several attempts to and from Cuba and some isolated hijackings in Hawaii, However, ... the hijacking rate in the United States increased dramatically in 1968 and remained high through 1972, A similar increase occurred in hijacking attempts outside the United States. There were two peaks in the rate of U.S. hijacking activity during that period, one early in 1969 and one in 1972 ... The first peak consisted primarily of hijackings by individuals seeking transportation to Cuba, whereas the second consisted primarily of extortion attempts. ...
The hijacking rate in the United States began to decline in late 1972 and never again reached the high level of the period 1968-72. In the 10-year period 1973-82, there Was an average of only 9.3 hijacking attempts in the United States per year, compared with 29 attempts per year for 1968-72. Foreign hijackings also decreased after 1972, though not as sharply as U.S. hijackings.
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All this is academic now. Hijacking an aircraft is now nearly impossible thanks to locked cockpit doors.
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That is ridiculous. A credible threat of a bomb on board is still going to pose the same threat that it ever did, and plenty of aircraft have been hijacked on that basis.
Re:For those of you that don't RTFA... (Score:5, Interesting)
More people died that day 12 years ago in car crashes than have died in all terrorist attacks within the USA *ever*. The TSA has killed more people than the terrorists did by making flying less pleasant so people take the far less-safe option of driving (actually, the break-even point for deaths from the Sep 11 attacks vs. deaths from TSA asshattery was passed over seven years ago).
I'm not saying it shouldn't be prosecuted or anything like that, but you (and well-meaning idiots like you, along with plenty of less-well-meaning people out to make a buck or grab some power) have blown the whole thing massively out of proprotion. How many people have died as a *direct* result of the US's response to those terrorist attacks, huh? Hell, how many of just US citizens? How many billions of dollars of military materiel? How many government expenditures on things like increased survellance and provably-ineffective airport scanners (strap a knife to your side; they can't see it)?
Let's assume that those $100 billion were all *directly* attributable to the terrorists (and not to, for example, re-routing planes all across the continent, shutting down airports, etc.). Wow, that sounds like a lot of money! Now, let's look at the damage to the US economy from the 2008 sub-prime mortgage collapse. The terrorists are all dead, and we spent a fuckton more money to go hunt down everybody connected to them. How about those bankers, though?
You go mourn your few thousand. Those of us who try to not let logic override our sense will fight the bigger threats to society, such as people who massively overreact to terrorism and do more damage to the country than the terrorists themselves could ever have dreamed of causing. Please stay the fuck out of our way.
Re:For those of you that don't RTFA... (Score:5, Insightful)
You go mourn your few thousand. Those of us who try to not let logic override our sense will fight the bigger threats to society,... Please stay the fuck out of our way.
So, you are one of those people then? Lets test that.
More people died that day 12 years ago in car crashes than have died in all terrorist attacks within the USA *ever*.
In the US in 2001 there were 42,196 traffic deaths. Averaging that out it comes to 116 deaths per day. 9/11 killed nearly 3,000 people, so you didn't get that right.
The TSA has killed more people than the terrorists did by making flying less pleasant so people take the far less-safe option of driving
It appears that it wasn't the TSA that did it, but people's reaction to the attacks. The law authorizing the TSA to even exist wasn't signed until November 2001 and the excess deaths started earlier. So, it looks like you didn't get that right either.
Driving Fatalities After 9/11: A Hidden Cost of Terrorism* [cornell.edu]
We show that the public’s response to terrorist threats can have unintended consequences that rival the attacks themselves in severity. Driving fatalities increased significantly after the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, events that prompted many travelers to substitute road transportation for safer air transportation. After controlling for time trends, weather, road conditions, and other factors, we find that travelers’ response to 9/11 resulted in 344 driving deaths per month in late 2001. Moreover, while the effect of 9/11 weakened over time, a total of about 2,170 driving deaths may be attributable to the attacks.
--------
How many people have died as a *direct* result of the US's response to those terrorist attacks, huh?
US and coalition forces have been responsible for only a minor percentage of civilian deaths in these conflicts. Most of the civilian deaths are a result of terrorist attacks or various forms of internecine warfare, such as the tribal and faction based warfare in Iraq. So, I don't think you've got a good understanding of that either.
Now, let's look at the damage to the US economy from the 2008 sub-prime mortgage collapse.
A big part of the sub-prime scandal was a political problem. A string of US presidents and other US politicians tried to use the regulatory power of government to force public and private lenders to make more loans to various poor and minority groups to try to increase home ownership under the theory it would benefit society. Unfortunately that meant forcing the lenders to make loans to people that couldn't pay back the loans, but the lenders didn't have much choice. The government regulators made it clear there would be consequences to the lenders if they didn't make the loans. That resulted in a lot of bad loans which were ultimately going to damage the lenders. Spreading risk is traditional way of managing risk in business. Unfortunately there were enough bad loans they were a big problem. The problem got worse when the loans were bundled and sold as securities. Add to that the craze for house flipping and real estate speculation and even more fuel was added to the fire. It was a huge problem. Although you don't directly state a view, since you are focusing on the bankers so heavily it seems likely to me that you probably don't have this right.
The terrorists are all dead, and we spent a fuckton more money to go hunt down everybody connected to them.
Actually no, they aren't all dead. Al Qaida and its affiliates were badly damaged, but they keep trying to rebuild and will be around for a long time to come. The more general problem of Islamic extremism won't be going away soon. The unrest the in the Middle East continues to add fuel to the f
Re:For those of you that don't RTFA... (Score:5, Insightful)
I also think you picked a rather ironic day to make that statement, the anniversary of an attack that killed 3,000 people and did $100,000,000,000 damage to the US economy.
Every year, ten times more have their lives abruptly cut off from car accidents alone. That means, as of this anniversary, the deaths from the greatest terrorist attack on American soil cost 1% of the lives as the outcome of something people happily (and not-so-happily) do every day, with little or no concern for their safety. If each of these people had $100,000 insurance, we would be about a third of the way to the same economic cost as the terrorist attack, assuming the only burden their death brought was the insurance payout.
Face it. There are only two reasons you care about this event. First, it's an affront to your (false) sense of security. To assuage that, you do other things to improve your sense of security. The evidence indicates they only return you to that false sense of security. Second, they all died in one small area over a short period of time. Kill each of them, with 9 of their friends each, over the span of a year, and it's just a somewhat upsetting fact of modern living. That's an emotional response with no logical basis on the safety of the average citizen. And yes, that means that a vehicle safety improvement that reduces risk of death by 10% will save more lives than those lost in the Twin towers. Each year. So, which one seems a better use of our resources, and yields a better quality of life?
Contrary to the myopic view of some people, the point isn't to spread fear, or to get people to live in fear, but rather to take reasonable precautions. Keeping hand grenades off planes is a reasonable precaution.
Well, I can hardly disagree. So that explains about 70 confiscations per year that the TSA has performed. Now, please explain to my why this applies to nail clippers, but not a nice pen [cross.com] with a reasonably sharp tip and a nice long metal body? Or 3 ounces of fluid? Even breast milk in a baby bottle, accompanied by said baby?
I'm not saying 9/11 wasn't a tragedy. It certainly was. All the daily activities in my life stopped for about 2 hours, as it did for everyone else in the office where I was working. And I was half a continent and a different country away. And I'm not saying reasonable precautions shouldn't be taken. It's the myriad unreasonable ones I'm frustrated with, and the attitude that there is no such thing as too much intrusion in order to stop the next really big terrorist attack, even though it took about 40 years of hostage takings on planes to get one of this significance. I swear, people won't be happy until airplanes look like they did in The Fifth Element (which was actually a spaceship, but the form factor and purpose was identical).
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First, if you want to accept the "more people get killed by accidents" argument, then the US should not have entered WW2 after Pearl Harbor. There were something like 40,000 people killed on the highways that year, and only 3,000 at Pearl Harbor.
I don't think the USA entered WW2 because of the number of people killed at that location and at that point in time. First, after that attack the USA didn't enter the war, they were already in a war. If they had done nothing, they would have lost the shortest war in history. Second, not fighting back would have meant that Japan's position would have become stronger and stronger. In 1945 the fight _would_ have been about Los Angeles if they had done nothing. (Maybe not, but a possibility).
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Yes, terrorism is rare. You can worry about them it if you want, but doing so is about as useful as worrying about slipping in the bathtub, getting hit by lightning, or being shot by law enforcement officers. If you want something to worry about, try cancer or heart disease (which kill over half a million Americans per year, each), or the 30,000+ people dying in car accidents every year.
Sure, have law enforcement take reasonable precautions. Spending trillions of dollars over the course of a decade on some
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A hand grenade is in essence a bomb. There have been plenty of hijackings committed in the past that relied on the threat of a hijacker to detonate a bomb. You don't know if the bomb is real or fake until it explodes, or doesn't. (And if it doesn't, are you sure it isn't simply a misfire that might yet explode?) The general stand taken when there is a threat of a bomb is to take actions so that the bomb doesn't explode as threatened. That means complying with the hijacker.
Simple enough? Contemplate t [slashdot.org]
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And what is the "official" response for why Building 7 magically collapsed again?
It wasn't magic, it was physics. I suppose to some people it might seem like magic. I threw in a few extra links - figured they might be useful to you.
NIST Releases Final WTC 7 Investigation Report [nist.gov]
World Trade Center Disaster Study [nist.gov]
The Theory vs. the Facts [slate.com]
Debunking the 9/11 Myths: Special Report [popularmechanics.com]
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They found 83 grenades ... do you know how many grenades they didn't find? When tested, they miss over half of handguns.
PS: you an stick a grenade up your asshole.
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If I were a terrorist, I would pop the pin in the terminal and toss it toward the crowd. Hundreds dead and wounded. A belt with several and a string tied to the pins would work wonders too. Hell, a belt tied to the pins, pull it out from under the jacket and give a good hard swing and grenades go everywhere!
Why would a terrorist want to bring a grenade on a plane?
Re:For those of you that don't RTFA... (Score:5, Informative)
I'm afraid your lovely theory is ruined by the history of hijacking.
El Al Flight 426 hijacking [wikipedia.org]
Richard Floyd McCoy, Jr. - Aircraft Hijacking [fbi.gov]
Hijacked Iraq Jet Crashes, Killing 62 : Two Hurl Grenades, Force Airliner Down in Saudi Arabia [latimes.com]
There are more.
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Re:For those of you that don't RTFA... (Score:5, Informative)
Furthermore, if I'm reading the numbers right, 1 live grenade out of 84 found - and that one was an accident by a travelling solider. The rest were completely inert and only look dangerous.
Re:For those of you that don't RTFA... (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:For those of you that don't RTFA... (Score:5, Insightful)
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This is what armored cockpit doors are for. You can detonate a bomb. You cannot take the plane over
You can open a pretty sturdy door with the right explosive...
Re:For those of you that don't RTFA... (Score:5, Funny)
Here's your solution, then. Make the sturdy doors ugly.
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This is what armored cockpit doors are for. You can detonate a bomb. You cannot take the plane over
You can open a pretty sturdy door with the right explosive...
Not being an explosives expert, I have to ask can you compromise the armored cockpit door without making the plane unflyable via either compromising the airframe, or blowing the door through the pilots?
Re:For those of you that don't RTFA... (Score:5, Insightful)
Obviously, that is not true. There are thousands of people worldwide who want to get on an explosive on a plane, but have failed. Even the shoe bomber got nowhere.
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He did however get the explosives onto the plane. As did the underwear bomber. They ran into the 2nd most important security change post 9/11, after sturdy locked doors, which is passenger and air crew attitudes toward, and reaction to, hijackers. Pre 9/11 the mantra was OK don't make any trouble for the hijackers. Post 9/11 the reaction of passengers and crew has been to vigorously restrain such people. The presumption with any security measure shoudl be that it will eventually fail. Somebody will find a
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There are thousands of people worldwide who want to get on an explosive on a plane, but have failed. Even the shoe bomber got nowhere.
He WAS on the plane, but his explosives failed to detonate. Same thing happened to the underwear bomber - failed to detonate, just burned the hell out of his private areas.
Both were subdued by passengers, which I'll argue is much more likely to happen now that we know the attackers' intent is to take over the plane and fly them into buildings. It used to be that the hijackers just wanted something so they'd hold everyone hostage. That made passengers compliant to demands - their lives weren't in imminent
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The 9/11 tragedy became possible for two reasons: easy access to cockpit and expectation that the hijackers will be using hostages for negotiations (as it was before 9/11). However, 9/11 showed to everyone that the 21st century hijackers might not be interested in negotiations. This immediately changed the rules of the game for everyone on board the plane. Now it became safer to fight the hijackers than try to follow orders hoping for a release after negotiations. This is the biggest reason why underwear or
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Re:For those of you that don't RTFA... (Score:5, Funny)
no, it's a nert with rounded corners.
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My wife uses a perfume called Flowerbomb. It comes in a glass container shaped like a grenade. I could imagine this causing an issue at airport scanners.
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Glass. You can see through it. Scanner Xrays pass right through it.
Just not a problem.
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Re:For those of you that don't RTFA... (Score:5, Interesting)
Actually, no.
Leaded glass does not have enough lead to make that much of a difference to xrays of the strength used to scan luggage.
Its not the same high lead content glass you find in radiation shielding items.
Further, nobody wastes leaded glass on perfume bottles any more, which is why all of the
old ones are becoming such collector's items.
Finally, anything you put in or on your body would/should not be stored in leaded glass.
You might drink wine or bourbon from a leaded glass, but you should never store it [wikipedia.org] in such.
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Because you didn't read the line that immediately follows the one you highlighted.
Re:For those of you that don't RTFA... (Score:4, Informative)
... and a quick Google search says your wrong.
The presence of lead or other heavy elements was not required for visualization. Fragments as small as 0.5 mm were easily detected if there was no overlying bone. [aappublications.org]
And a somewhat NSFW link with some glass objects that shouldn't be there [x-raytechn...aining.org].
Density makes a difference. It won't jump out like metal, but it should be visible. here are some examples and notes [x-rayscreener.com]
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In a world where a crime novel with a picture of a bomb on the cover is a problem, yes, a clear glass 'grenade' might be a problem.
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Is that a clever way of telling us that your wife is "da bomb"?
Re: For those of you that don't RTFA... (Score:2)
Re: For those of you that don't RTFA... (Score:5, Insightful)
You're right -- liquids over 100ml are still not permitted through the checkpoint.
Can't you just see the hilarity that would ensue if a passenger (or nearly all passengers for extra "Keystone"-factor) urinated into a >100ml container (besides the onboard holding tank) while in-flight, let it be known to the attendants/crew, and video recorded what happens?
So sick of the security theater. Even a good number of the people who, up till a couple of years ago, have been supportive of the TSA silliness are waking up and becoming ever-more disillusioned, angry, and disgusted. Hopefully enough will finally awake to change things sooner rather than later.
I say that, instead of putting all those TSA employees out of work, we simply re-task them to a more useful and productive role in society.
Picking up litter along all public roads, streets, and highways. Hell, have 'em clean alongside passenger railway lines, too. Take away their security toys and give them trash bags, buckets, rakes, & brooms. They wouldn't even need to change the agency initials.
"Trash and Sanitation Authority"
Has a nice ring to it, doesn't it?
I bet those fleets of nifty huge TSA SUVs and armored vehicles can move a lot of litter!
I'd even thank them for their hard work in that case, unlike now. At least it would be a respectable and useful job that actually benefits everyone and the environment at the same time it puts low-skilled people in stable jobs. It could also be a way to immensely reduce inmate recidivism rates by transitioning paroled prison inmates through such a job to a non-criminal, employed, and productive life with hope & opportunity.
Strat
Except the ones that are not fakes... (Score:2)
a majority of the confiscated grenades are fake, replicas or otherwise inert.
Except the ones that are not fakes...
Officers at Dallas Fort Worth (DFW) discovered a live 40mm high explosive grenade in a carry-on bag in 2012.
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Why not have them? Why have bunny slippers? Since when should people have to justify why they want to have their own personal items?
Re:For those of you that don't RTFA... (Score:4, Interesting)
As a professional paranoid*, I must ask whether you also had a permanent black marker in your possession, or could have had an accomplice carry one for you.
A few minutes in the bathroom completing a hasty art project makes a passable prop, and some convincing theatrics will make the passengers swear you had a full-size semi-automatic pistol aimed right at their head. Ask for anything, and you can probably get it.
The danger the TSA is looking for isn't what you have, but rather what you can do. Unfortunately, people can do anything [xkcd.com], including lying about what they can do with what they have, and ultimately that lets unscrupulous people do whatever they want.
* I work in IT, with a focus on security. I have a well-honed sense of paranoia.
Re:For those of you that don't RTFA... (Score:4, Funny)
So, no laptops running Windows ME?
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A grenade other than WP, frag, HE etc. is still a grenade. that's why they're still called grenades.
Fuck Network World (Score:5, Informative)
Complete Failure (Score:5, Insightful)
The TSA:
1) Allows ex convicts to grope your children.
2) Takes and stores full 3d scanned naked images of you using tech for which the cancer-risk has not been adequately assessed.
3) Steals valuables from your luggage.
4) Costs taxpayers a fortune.
and in return:
5) Has foiled exactly zero terrorist plots.
6) Fails to make you safer in any way.
Just sayin'.
Re:Complete Failure (Score:5, Funny)
The TSA sounds a lot like my exwife!
Badumtish!
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Oh, wait. Anonymous Coward. You will be here all week!
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She's a Priest?
Re:Complete Failure (Score:4, Insightful)
Actually, they might have foiled a terrorist plot without our ever finding out about it, because if or when a system is working as intended, the tendency is only natural to not notice what it is doing. The lack of any evidence to show that they have foiled any terrorist effort, therefore, is logically insufficient basis to presume that they have not actually possibly done so. You may be right, but since stopping such things is what they are supposed to do, there's no way to be certain, if only by their very presence, that they are not having some impact. (Indeed, technically only definitive ineffectiveness can be shown if or when a terrorist attempt that in hindsight should have been detected by the systems in place occurs).
You'll get no argument from me on your other points, however.
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Precisely - it's called deterrence, and it's very hard to determine it's effectiveness.
Re: Complete Failure (Score:4, Interesting)
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Prior to 9/11 there random searches and metal detectors with xrays. That didn't stop people. Why should a little more stop anyone? There are LOTS of ways to get into an airport. Supposedly the guys that planned 9/11 spent a long time planning it. They are going to let a little deterrence stop them?
TSA isn't about deterring anyone. It is about controlling the population and keeping them in fear.
Re:Complete Failure (Score:5, Insightful)
Hijackings were pretty rare in the US at the time of 9/11 and the security at the time did make it hard to smuggle in a gun or bomb. Before 9/11 I never heard of case where a gun was successfully smuggled onto a plane in the US. The hijackers on the planes on 9/11 bluffed everyone with threats of a bomb and box cutters for weapons. If this same scenario happened today the first people who stood up and announced they have a bomb and brandish a little knife would most likely get the ever living shit kicked out of them by the passengers. It was passengers who subdued the guy with underwear bomb. The guy who tried to light his shoes on fire to set off an explosion was also subdued by the passengers. Sure some passengers could get injured or even killed in the fight but that's still a whole lot better than killing everyone by crashing the plane.
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9/11 changed the stakes dramatically. Prior to 9/11, hijackings almost universally meant "fly this plane to Havana and we'll let you all go". As soon as the hijackers upped the ante to "we're gonna plow this thing into the nearest building, killing all of you", they forever ensured that no box cutter would stop the passengers from beating them into a paste.
Re:Complete Failure (Score:5, Insightful)
Besides passengers fighting back instead of sitting back and letting a hijacking happen, the only worthwhile security that happened after 9/11 was the locked, reinforced cabin doors. That ensures that the hijackers can't get into the cabin before the passengers take them out. Other than that, pre-9/11 screening (checking for guns, knives, etc) would have been enough. Yes, it let the hijackers through, but the "increased TSA security" has also let through people with weapons.
Re:Complete Failure (Score:5, Insightful)
Correct... but only AFTER the detonator failed to ignite the explosive material... but instead ignited his pants and resulted in no boom.
Correct... but only AFTER he was unsuccessful at lighting the fuse.
In both cases it was not the passengers subduing the attackers which prevented the deaths of those onboard... but instead luck that neither device went off.
Re:Complete Failure (Score:4, Informative)
In both cases it was not the passengers subduing the attackers which prevented the deaths of those onboard... but instead luck that neither device went off.
Of course this happened AFTER he got through TSA screening.
Re:Complete Failure (Score:5, Informative)
In both cases it was not the passengers subduing the attackers which prevented the deaths of those onboard... but instead luck that neither device went off.
Of course this happened AFTER he got through TSA screening.
Not technically correct in either case:
The "Underware bomber" (Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab) was coming from Amsterdam.
The "Shoe Bomber" (Richard Colvin Reid) was inbound from Paris.
So neither one had been screened by US TSA.
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Re:Complete Failure (Score:5, Funny)
Lisa: Dad, what if I were to tell you that this rock keeps away tigers.
Homer: Uh-huh, and how does it work?
Lisa: It doesn't work. It's just a stupid rock.
Homer: I see.
Lisa: But you don't see any tigers around, do you?
Homer: Lisa, I'd like to buy your rock.
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You may be right, but since stopping such things is what they are supposed to do, there's no way to be certain, if only by their very presence, that they are not having some impact
They are having an impact all right. They cost us money and time. Anecdotal evidence suggests some tourists aren't coming to American because of them. And evidence suggests driving has gone up, and because driving is statistically less safe than flying, more people have died has a result.
So we can't tell if TSA has deterred anyone (would it really? What we did previously didn't stop anyone, why should the TSA) but evidence has suggested they failed to stop some terrorists, like the underwear guy and the s
It isn't just grenades that they find (Score:2)
TSA finds average of 4 guns each day at airports, with number continuing to rise since 2007 [nydailynews.com]
If it is all just "security theater," the "patrons" seem a bit over-armed.
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I'm shocked it's that low. 4 guns a day nationwide is pretty small. You've got to figure out of the millions pouring through airports daily at least a tiny percentage are bat shit crazy. Maybe not even such a tiny percentage. I remember reading about one guy who freaked out on a flight and his fellow passengers got so frightened that they killed him. This was before 911.
http://abcnews.go.com/Travel/story?id=118734&page=1 [go.com]
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TSA finds average of 4 guns each day at airports, with number continuing to rise since 2007 [nydailynews.com]
If it is all just "security theater," the "patrons" seem a bit over-armed.
As much as I agree with you, the TSA is overkill.
Airport security should be able to detect guns without 3D scanners and "enhanced pat downs". Same with terrorist plots, airport security is the absolute last line of defence, we shouldn't arm it or treat it as the first line.
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Guns which would almost certainly have been found using the pre-9/11 security procedures.
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In another announcement: (Score:4, Funny)
The US Postal Service would like to take this opportunity to remind everyone to get your letter bombs in the mail early this year.
Thank You,
Still use Post-It Notes for these things (Score:2)
applicable quotes (Score:2)
No one in this world, so far as I know — and I have searched the record for years, and employed agents to help me — has ever lost money by underestimating the intelligence of the great masses of the plain people. H.L Mencken
improperly attributed to him as:
No one ever went broke by underestimating the intelligence of the American Public
-I'm just sayin'
I carried on a mock roadside bomb once (Score:4, Interesting)
I carried on a mock EFP on a flight to L.A. The TSA didn't even open the bag. I was kind of appalled, because there was a lot of sharp steel in it even though there was no explosive. But then on my return trip they took my tiny little drill bits, because drill bits are forbidden.
Another time I tried to carry on a big knife by accident, but they found it. I would guess most of the confiscated guns are like that. Sam Kinison even had a routine about this.
I think its all bullshit, especially the millimeter wave stuff, its just a big money making scheme for L3 and their corrupt government patrons. If someone wanted to kill a bunch of people at an airport, the best place would be the queue at the security check. If I had my way we would fly unmolested and accept the risk. Locking the cockpit doors solves most of the problem, and most of the rest of it solved by having a population with some sense of honor, willing to fight back instead of just cowering and waiting to die. My wishful thinking isn't going to change the culture though.
So I wonder? (Score:3)
How many grenades they missed?
most of them aren't even real (Score:2)
Good job with security theater TSA.
You're So Warped But So Beautiful (Score:2)
'Leave Your Grenades at Home'
It's all so darkly twisted and Kafkaesque. As a non American looking in I can't imagine that in a 100 years some history student reading his text book will ever know how twistedly, wickedly funny and scary and sad it all is.
Fireworks, explosives (Score:4, Funny)
Back in the 70s my father traveled from Aberdeen to London. In his baggage he had several kilos of explosives for an outdoor son et lumiere production he was the technical theater manager for. He was stopped by the security guard before boarding the plane. The guard asked "Sir what do you have in these bags" my father replied "explosives", the guard then replied "very funny sir" and waved him onto the plane. Times have changed... but it might surprise you what people think they can carry onto a plane.
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So, TSA, how many of those grenades were actually real grenades as opposed to fake, dud, decoy, joke grenades? Do you still shut down the entire airport "out of abundance of caution" for a novelty cigarette lighter shaped like a grenade?
The answer is ..... RTFA.
Re:And of those grenades... (Score:4)
Just out of curiosity, are you arguing with the "no grenades" policy?
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I'm not one to agree with the TSA, but confiscating any grenade, even one that the owner insists is a dud, seems to be a good security policy.
Re:What about (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:What about (Score:5, Funny)
Re:What about (Score:4, Funny)
Lasers not in the company of sharks appear to be OK [avherald.com].
Well duh. Sharks need more than 3 ounces of water. And if there's one thing I've learned from traveling, it's that more than 3 ounces of water is dangerous and only a terrorist would try to bring that though an airport checkpoint.
Re: What about (Score:5, Funny)
Ahhh but water, much like the atom, will completely lose power when split.
That 6 oz. water container is hazardous and must be banned, but if split into 2 3oz bottles, the danger is gone.
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You planning on winning the big race and shaking the presidents hand?
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To counter the snakes, of course.