TSA what's next?

[Mike]

This is scary (again) and almost ironic that you posted this (and revived the thread) only a few hours before many more people died at an airport in Russia. The same could have happened in the States and there would be nothing the TSA could have done about it other than reacting....

What also bugs me is that these people are pretty crafty in choosing the names for their ventures.
The "PATRIOT" act has as much to do with being patriotic as the "Federal Reserve" is a Federal bank. It's crazy that they get away with it!!

Also, having just flown with the airlines again and having spent numerous more hours at airports I was wondering if all the good that get sold there (including the very expensive "Dasani" water which Coke seems to have a monopoly on) also gets screened before it gets moved to the stores in the terminals and gates. Does anybody know?
My guess is "probably not"......

 

[Rooster Cruiser]

CLASSIFIED INFORMATION
=====================
 

 

Year to date statistics on Airport screening from the Department of Homeland Security




Terrorist Plots Discovered: 0
Transvestites: 533
Hernias: 1,085
Hemorrhoid Cases: 3,172
Enlarged Prostates: 8,249
Breast Implants: 59,350
Natural Blondes: 3


 

[Mike]

here is another funny (but not so funny) strips, as drawn by one of our idols:

[Rooster Cruiser]

EWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW!!!!!!!!!!!   

Its bad enough when someone's dog humps my leg, but TSA!?!?!?  NO FRIGGIN WAY DUDE!   

RC

[YawningMan]

Yeah, looking forward to the first anus bomber!   

Sorry, Stef. I couldn't resist eating at Taco Bell before that flight, and I love me some refried beans and guacamole! 

[Mike]

Have you guys seen the Homeland Security guy talk on the news today?
They are revamping the alert system which now will let us know what the specific threat is. Also, they will make the "If you see something suspicious, report it" system better and grant immunity to people who report others to keep the reported party from sueing the reporting party. (to get more reports, I guess?)

THAT SCARES THE CRAP OUT OF ME ! ! ! 

If you see something suspicious, report it

For a kid that grew up not far from the iron curtain in a time where the GeStaPo and Eastern Germany still existed this is very very concerning.
If people don't wake up soon this will exactly be the way we're headed. We already have phone tapping, fingerprinting, background checks, and more...
This is not what I had envisioned "the land of the free" would be when I learned about this country.....

[4X-NTY]

This is a bit TSA related, I guess.

About a month ago I had kind of a rough weekend, I had to go to a personal interview in Tel Aviv to see if I fit for a pre-army year of community service in Kibbutz Samar, and the day after I had to go to jerusalem for two days of seminar and assortments to the Jerusalemic pre-military leadership program.
I live a three hours drive by bus from tel Aviv and four from Jerusalem,and my father lives two hours drive from Tel Aviv and two hours from Jerusalem, given that, I decided to return to my father from Tel Aviv and the day after go to Jerusalem. I had to carry a really big bag with clothes and what not and a sleeping bag.

Now, there's one thing you should know about Israel, you get a security check every time you enter a public building, that means that you need to open your bags and get checked by a handheld metal detector, but it's seems completely normal to us, there's even a joke that says that the best way to find an Israeli is to look for people in the entrance of a mall looking desperately for someone to check their bags. So, seeing that in Tel Aviv I had to go to three public building, one of them is the central bus station in tel aviv, handling thousands of people a day, that big bag I carried was a pain in the ass, it took me about a two minutes to open all the pockets and untying the sleeping bag, a big hold-up for the people after me, in one place I had to leave my Leatherman in the entrance after it triggered the metal detector .

I came to realize that since Jerusalem is more threatened by terror attacks than Tel Aviv, so the security check is going to be awful.
When I got to the central bus station in Jerusalem I was expecting a really long inspection of my bags, but no, to my amazement there was an X-ray machine for the bags and a metal detector, just before I put my bags in the X-ray machine I remembered that I had a Leatherman burried deep down in my bag, I asked the security guy if that would be a problem, he said that it probably won't, That made me realize that when there's a real threat, everything will be efficient and effective rather than theatrical and just bothering. So, in a way, there's a good side that TSA can allow itself doing all those theatrical things.

[Oddball]

will they have the "Bikini Special" board at the front of the terminal to tell you what the threat level is?

[Mike]

Here is a good article on how they are planning on clamping down on GA as well.
It's a little long but well worth the read:


http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2011/01/of-airplanes-fences-and-national-security/70129/


Of Airplanes, Fences, and National Security
Jan 27 2011, 6:05 PM ET By James Fallows
By Lane Wallace

Although I've written about aviation for over 20 years now, I rarely write about it on The Atlantic's site because Jim Fallows already does such an excellent job of covering the topic here. But I do want to add a few words to what Jim's already said (all of which I wholeheartedly agree with) in response to Jeffrey Goldberg's "Private Plane, Public Menace" dispatch piece that ran in this month's Atlantic.

After getting a ride in a friend's corporate jet, Goldberg concludes that privileged "general aviation" airplanes threaten national security because their passengers aren't subject to the same TSA security that airline passengers are, and he argues that we need to impose that kind of security at general aviation facilities and airports.

I disagree with Goldberg's position on a couple of different levels. First, his description of what constitutes "general aviation" is skewed. And second, attempts to impose TSA-type security at small airports are not only, as Jim said, "wrongheaded" -- akin to attacking a fly with a clumsy and ineffective sledgehammer -- but they are also destroying one of the most valuable resources that airports offer America.

To understand why I agree with Jim that TSA-style security measures are neither required in the world of general aviation, nor the best approach to what security risk does exist in that world, it helps to understand, first, what "general aviation" really is. From there, it's easier to understand why the risk is not what many people imagine, as well as what's wrong with taking a TSA approach to security for every airplane and every airport across America.


So, what is "general aviation"? The way Goldberg describes the world of non-airline flying: "'general' being a euphemism for 'private,'" and private, in Goldberg's eyes, being a euphemism for "toys of the spoiled rich" -- is not uncommon among non-pilots. It describes a segment of aviation that is very visible, and which surely does exist. But that segment is also a very small piece of the picture.

Corporate or individually-owned jets constitute only 4 percent of privately owned aircraft. (Another 3 percent are jet engine-powered propeller planes, akin to the smallest of commuter planes.) The overwhelming majority of private aircraft are less-expensive and less-powerful piston-engine airplanes, and a whopping 68 percent of all private airplanes are single-engine piston aircraft.

In addition, most of those piston-powered, single-engine airplanes are not the shiny new models pictured in the magazines. Almost 90 percent of general aviation aircraft are more than 20 years old. Every airplane has to go through a thorough mechanical inspection every year, and essential parts (like engines) are replaced at set times. So the age of most planes isn't a safety issue. But it is reflected in their cost and value.

A brand-new Cirrus might carry a price tag of a half a million dollars, but my first airplane -- a 1946 two-seat Cessna that I bought in 1986 for only $5,000, could still be bought today for under $15,000. And my current airplane, 1977 Grumman Cheetah, which has a larger piston engine and four seats, has a current market value of around $30,000. Or about the price of a new Saab sedan. 

What's more, many of those piston-powered single engines aren't the performance machines people imagine them to be. To fly coast to coast in my own single-engine airplane, for example, takes -- west to east, when the winds are predominantly at my back -- 30 flight hours. Which generally equates to six days, given that I don't fly in bad weather and limit my "pilot-in-command" time to about six hours a day, because I don't have an autopilot. In other words, you could drive the distance in less time.

There are also pilots like Jim, who have faster airplanes and "instrument" pilot ratings that permit them to fly in bad weather, allowing them to get a lot more utility out of their airplanes. But only 15 percent of licensed pilots have a current instrument rating. For the rest of us, flying isn't something we do for utility's sake. 

So why do pilots sacrifice and scrape together the money to fly, if not for a useful purpose? The reasons vary, of course. But for many, many pilots, it has to do with remembering something we all used to know, back when we were still young enough to believe that anything was possible and dreams could come true. "Three year olds," I once wrote in an essay on the subject, "may not know much about physics, investment banking, literature, or even the meaning of life, but they understand something very important about living.... [They understand] that life is in the ever-changing moment of the present, that joy is more important than possessions, and that dreams are the lifeblood of a heart and soul."


Unfortunately, as we grow older many of us find, or are told so many times that we start to believe it, that anything is not possible and dreams are for dreamers; irresponsible luxuries not related to putting food on the table. We live long enough to know the demons of disappointment and the restrictions of life's boundaries. Little by little, we lose that three-year-old belief in magic, dreams, and possibilities. And little by little, an important piece of our hearts dies.

And that is why many pilots fly. The exact incidents that draw future pilots to airports differ widely. But for many of them, the reason they stay is that in some way they can't even quite articulate, airplanes and flight bring that piece of their heart back to life. After all, flight itself a metaphor for freedom and possibility. A couple thousand feet up in the air, all the limits and disappointments of daily life fade away beneath an endless horizon and the thought, remembered again, of how unbelievably beautiful and vast the world is; how full of possibilities and roads still untraveled.


It's why airports are -- or can be -- such magical places. On a practical level, they're all a valuable part of our national transportation system. But they are also community resources; places where anyone can go, watch, sense, and perhaps recapture a little of that childhood belief in dreams, freedom, and possibilities.

Why does that matter in a discussion of national security? Because when we fence small airports off behind 14-foot barbed-wire barriers and rigid TSA procedures, we separate them from the communities they were built to serve, and separate communities from a resource that might offer them something even more valuable than transportation. We also kill the magic itself. It's hard to imagine someone wandering out to the airport pictured below and seeing it as a place full of dreams and possibilities. And yet, post-9/11 Homeland Security funding is leading to far more fences like this one:


Now maybe, if those fences and measures were really necessary, and actually worked, and worked better than other approaches, their collateral cost might be acceptable, even if unfortunate. But they are none of those things, for several reasons: 

1. It's a rare airport fence that can't be gotten around, if you know your way around. The high fences and intimidating signs make airports seem unapproachable by community people, but they tend to fall more into the realm of "security theater" (which Jim has talked about many times) than a real deterrent for someone intent on getting access to an airport or airplane for nefarious reasons.

2. Despite the public's fears of a rogue pilot with terrorist intentions, most general aviation airplanes are extremely limited in the damage they can inflict. There's a reason the 9/11 attackers chose 767 airliners filled to the brim with fuel for transcontinental flights for their weapons. Something smaller wouldn't have been effective. Recall that in the same week as a van driven by an elderly man went out of control in Herald Square, New York, killing half a dozen people, a small airplane flown by a suicidal teenager crashed into an office building in Tampa, Florida, doing serious damage to a desk.

3. The power of human connections. Aviation is a small community, and individual airports are like very small towns. Strangers stand out. And pilots look after each other. A private plane is also a different environment than an airliner. Airliners carry a large number of people who don't know each other. So the risk of a lone terrorist making their way on board is real. That's not the case on a private plane. You know your fellow passengers. What's more, if you blow up an airliner, you kill a lot of innocent people who are on board with you. That's not the case with a private plane--which is another reason they're less attractive as a target.

But what about Goldberg's fear that a group of terrorists could charter an aircraft large enough to do some amount of damage on the ground, if they incapacitated the pilots? It could happen, of course -- with or without TSA procedures. But here I think Jim Fallows is correct in arguing for the power of internal HUMINT (HUMan INTelligence) over TSA robo-screeners. Charter operators I've talked to say they take a number of measures to make sure their customers aren't going to turn out to be nightmares: they don't take cash, they do background credit checks, and they also pay a lot of attention to their gut when it comes to accepting potential customers. After all, the operators have a multi-million dollar asset to protect. If something about a potential customer, or their behavior, doesn't smell right, they don't take the job. 

The bottom line is that there's some level of risk in a lot of places (see my earlier post on this subject). But by overreacting with a sledgehammer to the relatively small risk that general aviation airplanes pose, we lose something that is perhaps even more important to preserve, in this post-9/11 world: a connection and access to places that have the ability to remind us that fears and limits can be overcome, and dreams and possibilities are still worth believing in.

[spacer]

Have you guys seen the Homeland Security guy talk on the news today?
They are revamping the alert system which now will let us know what the specific threat is. Also, they will make the "If you see something suspicious, report it" system better and grant immunity to people who report others to keep the reported party from sueing the reporting party. (to get more reports, I guess?)

THAT SCARES THE CRAP OUT OF ME ! ! ! 

If you see something suspicious, report it

For a kid that grew up not far from the iron curtain in a time where the GeStaPo and Eastern Germany still existed this is very very concerning.
If people don't wake up soon this will exactly be the way we're headed. We already have phone tapping, fingerprinting, background checks, and more...
This is not what I had envisioned "the land of the free" would be when I learned about this country.....

"I don't like that guy in the next hangar. Dude's a real jerk sometimes... I'll show him! I'll just make a little phone call."

[Mike]

"I don't like that guy in the next hangar. Dude's a real jerk sometimes... I'll show him! I'll just make a little phone call."

Exactly my point!

Isn't that scary ? ? ? ?

 

[vldflight]

Its extremely scary.  I want to say thank you guys for giving me another perspective on this.  You lived near the Iron Curtain, and to have you compare what is happening here in the States to that is a real eye opener that I wish more people could see.  We are rapidly losing the very freedoms that we are founded upon.  I'm sorry, but I would rather risk losing some lives, mine included, than give up the very freedoms that make our country such a wonderful place to live and prosper.  It has gotten to the point that no matter what we do anymore, the government is up our @#$ in some way.  I really wish more people would wake up and see these changes for what they really are, and your outside view hit the nail on the head...again thank you.

[Fabo]

Hell, even on this side of the curtain, if you shut up and went along, they left you alone... but this?