What TSA Is Really Going To See

[Joe Williams]

theres no way is hell youd get a plane thats worth a damn for less than the price of a pickup...maybe like a 62 cessna thats slow but the 182 full glass that i fly is 349 thousand dollars new. not quite as cheap as a pickup...not to mention thats only a 4 seater...you could get a 78 bonanza 6 seater for a hundred grand. my dads friend had one

Brand new pickup trucks are easily $35K-$50K nowadays. It would be hard to find a decent six seater for that, but you can get four seaters for that. The right '62 Skylane would be a perfectly good plane, and the new ones aren't any faster! I do have some time in a '59 182, and loved every minute of it!

You can also get four seat Mooneys (if you don't like elbow room) and Bo's for $50K. Actually, a pretty fair selection of perfectly serviceable 4 seaters for that. And, unlike cars, you pay them off on 20-30 year loans if you don't happen to have $50K sitting around. Of course, once you buy it, you gotta support it! Hangar fees and annuals will run you $2500 a year at least, gotta have money set aside for engine overhauls, fuel, unscheduled mx, etc. $15K a year to own and fly your own at a minimum. Of course, if 105 knots (120 mph) is good enough for you, that same $50K buys you a much nicer plane, and $10K a year is a good figure for many owners.

 

[evansvillethompsongunner]

I'm talking an old two seater, maybe a Piper or a Cessna.

Older friend of mine took me up awhile back, and it was a blast.

 

[Lex Concord]

So what should the airlines do to keep us safe?

Ideally? As you board, you would see a flight attendant with a tray full of frangible ammo..."What caliber today, sir?"

 

[dburkhead]

Ideally? As you board, you would see a flight attendant with a tray full of frangible ammo..."What caliber today, sir?"

Or the one I have cited oft enough before (from Michael Z. Williamson's novel Freehold):

At the airport, the procedure was strange to her. There was no search of her or her luggage, she didn't need fingerprints or retina pics to prove who she was and they had a procedure for weapons safety. She'd forgotten she was wearing her sidearm, as she now wore it out of habit.
"Please clear your weapon, Ms Pacelli," an attendant asked. She blushed and complied, stuffing the magazine and spare round into her pouch. "We'd prefer that you store it in your pouch and in the underseat stowage. You'll still be able to reach it quickly in an emergency, but it eliminates the chance of an accident."
She nodded in response. It made sense. Given the obsession with personal freedom here coupled with the need to avoid accidents, it made sense. A historical scan she'd done the week before indicated there'd never been a successful act of piracy, questionable commandeering or hijacking aboard any Freehold aircraft, transport or registered vessel. Ever. She couldn't conceive of any UN nation ever considering allowing personal weapons, however. It was an alien concept.

 

[Lex Concord]

This thread just begs for this....

[FONT=Times New Roman, Times, serif]On February 17, at Dulles International Airport outside of Washington, DC, a young Nigerian terrorist named Farouk Abdul al Faisal attempted to board United Airlines flight 1497 to Stuttgart, Germany. He had eluded detection by the FBI, and was not on the Terrorist Watch List. He seemed to have succeeded in his aims.

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[FONT=Times New Roman, Times, serif]Al Faisal had not counted on an alert TSA employee, as none had been encountered before. TSA agent Michael Trabinney noticed that Faruouk’s cheeks were puffed out strangely. He pulled the young African aside for further screening and discovered in his mouth a condom filled with black powder and a detonator. Trabinney sounded the alarm and Farouk was arrested. The Department of Homeland Security immediately closed the airport for three days, saying that, since the terrorist was in custody and posed no further threat, extreme measures were necessary. Travel snarled around the world as flights were diverted or canceled.[/FONT]

[FONT=Times New Roman, Times, serif]Janet Napolitano, the chief of DHS, said in a press conference that the event “showed the lengths to which enemies of our freedoms will go. In order to keep Americans safe, the Department will initiate mouth exams on all boarding passengers. Henceforth no condoms will be allowed on board.”[/FONT]

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[FONT=Times New Roman, Times, serif]A contract for three billion dollars was issued to buy latex detectors, and an additional agent was added at each security gate in the nation, at a salary of sixty thousand dollars a year. They told barefoot passengers to “Say ah.”[/FONT]


[FONT=Times New Roman, Times, serif]President Obama, according to some being worried about seeming soft on national security, announced that he would talk with his counterparts in other countries about requiring oral exams, and would fund research into automated ah-scanners. Manufacturers of dental equipment received development contracts totaling $1.2 billion.[/FONT]
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[FONT=Times New Roman, Times, serif]The new measures went relatively smoothly, though there were isolated glitches. A woman with a broken jaw wired shut was pulled out of line, interrogated for hours, and arrested for refusing to answer questions except to say “Ummm, ummm.” A TSA agent at Houston International, hired under federal affirmative-action guidelines, confiscated a latex glove, saying that it looked like a multiple-use condom and you never could be too careful with terrorists.[/FONT]
[FONT=Times New Roman, Times, serif]
[/FONT]
[FONT=Times New Roman, Times, serif]Following the implementation of the new measures, airline traffic fell five percent.[/FONT]

[FONT=Times New Roman, Times, serif]Read the rest...[/FONT]


The Price of Freedom by Fred Reed

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[dwh79]

How about adding a 4th option...
Like being personally accountable for your own safety.
- It works in almost every other part of our society. Armed people are a deterent from terrorism. One of the main reasons terrorists attack airlines is because they are a soft target that draws a lot of attention.

Just the .02 from someone on the line actively engaging the terrorists...

So they won't directly engage us. The last few attempts have been just blowing up the whole thing up. Now will we stop everything no. I believe that the body scanners will deter some. I believe that saving some is better than just having a complete 100% crap shoot.

 

[dburkhead]

So they won't directly engage us. The last few attempts have been just blowing up the whole thing up. Now will we stop everything no. I believe that the body scanners will deter some. I believe that saving some is better than just having a complete 100% crap shoot.

Except it doesn't save anybody. All it does it create new targets (see above about security checkpoint lines).

You are advocating giving up liberty not for safety (which would be bad enough) but for the illusion of safety.

Of the various attempts/plots/conspiracies since 9/11 not one was stopped by the new security procedures. The majority were stopped by simple police work before they got anywhere near the airport. Reid and the Christmas bomber went right past security.

The Christmas Bomber's explosive was about 80 grams of PETN. Given the density of PETN that's a bit less than 3 tablespoons of material. If you can't think of at least a dozen ways to get that much explosive past any realistic security system then you aren't half trying.

Spend a bit of time online browsing explosives used by industry and the military: adhesive backed sheets 10X18X1/16 inch that can be cut to shape and fitted onto, or into, anything you'd like including your own skin. "Paste" explosive in caulk guns. Fill the shell of a laptop or PDA, seal it up, and clean the outside so that there's no detectable nitrate residue to be checked for. Sure, the device would soon overheat if run for very long but it will run for long enough to turn it on and show that it is a "real" laptop or PDA at security.

I'm not an explosives and demolitions expert. I'm a scientist in a completely different field. I'm also a writer who researches and thinks about this kind of thing for story possibilities. And if I can think about this kind of thing you know the folk who really want to hurt us are perfectly capable of thinking about it. And you know that once you get a high enough level the folk in charge know just how many holes there are in the so-called security.

And security that's has "only some holes" and is "just a little bit penetrable" is like being a little bit pregnant. There will always be holes. The so-called security cannot stop terrorists who want to bring down a plane. It's only that the folk making the attempt post 9/11 have been utter incompetents that have prevented more airplanes falling from the sky.

It's not really surprising that the attempts made have been by utter morons. The competent recognize that it's not a paying proposition to attempt to bring down airliners and the reasons it's not a paying proposition have nothing to do with "security." A large part of that reason is found in Flight 93.

 

[jeremy]

So they won't directly engage us. The last few attempts have been just blowing up the whole thing up. Now will we stop everything no. I believe that the body scanners will deter some. I believe that saving some is better than just having a complete 100% crap shoot.

Ever heard of the saying "A death by a thousand cuts"?

The object of their attacks is not really to kill Americans that is just a bonus for them. The idea is to make us spend money on not killing them. How many trillions of dollars are being spent on our security? Why? Does it actually make us safer or is this an illusion of safety... Do you honestly believe that any Government Agency can stop one person dedicated to destroying something? We can not even stop the invasion across our southern border.

 

[pinshooter45]

We'll just have to put up with it or drive!

As much as I really think the Fedral Gov. & TSA are staffed with people who are clueless. IMHO it will never change unless we force change at the Ballot Box. The US Constitution clearly gives the feds power to regulate interstate commerce. And airlines clearly fall here, no one will ever get the ability to carry concealed under current circumstances. The feds will continue getting this wrong until real change is made! That power is also way too much abused and stretched by the Feds. Some one please explain how education, health care, come under Interstate commerce? I also belive congress uses the "To promote the general Welfare" clause to justify WELFARE, Social Security, and medicare and medicaid. Must be where they get the authority to shove this "Health Care Refom" down our throats! Ok I'll get of my soap box now, I feel better...not really!