Yeah, if anything small knives seem like a legitimate threat given box cutters were used on 9/11 to kill people. It's about time to allow shoes and belts to remain on -- it doesn't make sense to take them off if you're going to force people through naked xray scanners either.
i've asked before about my sealed bottle of water, if i open and drink half of it in front of the agent, can i take the other half aboard? no, of course not.
Every time I'm not allowed to take on my clear, sealed water bottle, I drink it right in front of them in one large sip and walk through with an empty water bottle. Then, I find a drinking fountain on the other side of security and refill it, preferably within eyesight. I know they supposedly don't care, but more people need to flaunt the ridiculousness of the rules so the large bulk of travelers feel less alone in criticizing the TSA.
Breast milk is expressly allowed. I have personally taken breast milk through the airport with my children by myself (I'm a man) and they didn't bat at eye at me. Supposedly you can take it through without the child too, which makes sense for traveling, pumping mothers.
Sometime they will test it, which involves holding a small trip of paper above the open container. I think that happened only once to me.
They are pretty lax most times if you have children along. You can take water through with kids (or at least I have several times), and they have always skipped any of the extra screening and scanning when I'm with my kids. We just walk right through the metal detector.
they have always skipped any of the extra screening and scanning when I'm with my kids
I, on the other hand, made the mistake of putting my toddler daughter in a party dress with a fluffy skirt which a TSA agent had to pat down to make sure there wasn't anything hiding in there. We weren't treated aggressively or anything like that. But the whole thing felt ridiculous.
Insulin is not, my mom has flown with her pump and extra insulin. They even let the syringes go with it. Just has to have proper labeling, not like an industrious terrorist/loon would ever know to fake that.
People said the same thing about box cutters prior to 9/11. The Flight Attendants Union Coalition is against this too, so there is plenty of objection.
I can think of several places I could cut you with a knife like that which would cause you to bleed to death in minutes. That doesn't actually seem like a good reason to prohibit them; larger knives, clubs and guns are legal to carry in most public places in the US. Crowded places with hundreds of witnesses are not where people usually assault each other with these items.
The threat of hijacking is the reason planes get special treatment, but the combination of secure cockpit doors and the perception that hijacking will lead to the deaths of everyone on the plane makes gaining access to the cockpit effectively impossible regardless of the availability of weapons.
It's interesting to see flight attendants objecting to allowing even those knives in airplane cabins. I'd like to be able to carry a pocket knife on an airplane again. The last pocket knife I bought was actually bought (just before 11 September 2001) to bring along with me on plane trips, which I was never able to do on a carry-on basis. That knife was eventually confiscated a couple years ago when I still had it in my pocket as I was about to go on a plane trip with my son.
I remember better days of air travel, when everyone felt a lot more carefree.
But on an issue like this, I have a lot of empathy for the flight attendants, and might sooner advocate for keeping my shoes on in the airport rather than again making it convenient to carry knives on board airplanes. With training, any device that can cut a pilot's or flight attendant's carotid artery can be used to take over a plane. Intelligence to stop the plots to take over airplanes from happening in the first place is an essential step in defense, but maybe leaving knives in checked baggage is another.
I'd rather have less invasive searches than tiny pocketknives too, but I don't think such knives present any real risk of taking over a plane.
Sure, an attacker could kill people with a small knife, but killing and/or threatening passengers and flight attendants will not gain an attacker access to the cockpit. Everyone involved now assumes that a hijacker who gains access to the cockpit will try to crash the plane in to a building, so a significant portion of people will fight to the death against any attempt to enter the cockpit. I suspect everyone who would seriously contemplate hijacking a plane knows this and would not attempt a plan using only small knives.
It wouldn't. A hijacking attempt with say... a katana might injure or kill a few more defending passengers than a pocketknife, but the outcome would be the same.
Actually, I would figure it'd be easier for them to hurt you with a pocket knife than a katana. Airplanes are small spaces, and large swords are unwieldy. Even samurai used wakizashis indoors more than huge katanas.
No hijacker, whether of the crash-the-plane or hostage-exchange sort, actually wants to use their weapon. Neither running around slashing people, nor shooting off bullets in a plane. So bigger, scarier weapons are more effective at the job of creating terrified compliance. People who would rush a pocket knife may balk at rushing a machete.
I don't really see this lasting for very long. All it will take is one drunk, out of control idiot with a pocket knife to ruin the whole thing. I think most of us remember those two RIM employees who were so drunk they tried to chew their way through their restraints. Now imagine if they had pocket knives...
It's funny that when people enter into the realm of hypotheticals they never think about how a laptop or tablet can put a good sized dent in someone's head.
The thing that keeps airplanes safe is the miniscule number of bad actors. That's about it. Unfortunately, that truth makes people feel insecure. Me? I'd fly even if there was no security at all. The odds are in favor of safety.
We managed for 50+ years allowing knives, lighters, etc. on flights--hell, they used to let you smoke in-flight, and nobody started a fire (maliciously).
That and, unless you have half the plane on your side, the odds on a 9/11 style attack resulting in anything but you being beaten into a coma are next to nil.
What terrorists understand (but we don't) is that nobody will ever successfully hijack a plane again.
The 9/11 attacks worked because historically, a hijacked plane would invariably be diverted to some far-flung airstrip and become a hostage situation. Anyone in such a situation understood that their risk of being killed was very low, so long as they complied with the hostage-takers. It took less than a day for passengers to realise that the risks of action and inaction had inverted, as we saw in the case of flight United 93.
The hijacking MO used on 9/11 was a one-time deal. Passengers now understand that rather than being safe so long as they comply with hijackers, they are doomed unless they fight back. As such, a knife on a plane is no more dangerous than a knife on a bus or a train - the attacker might injure or kill a handful of people, but they'll quickly be overwhelmed by sheer force of numbers.
It's for this reason that all subsequent terrorist plots against aviation have been bombs, with the intention of taking down the plane in flight.
Schneier has repeatedly pointed out this systematic failure in security thinking - responding to the last threat, rather than the next.
The best part of that linked document is that golf clubs are OK, but you can't have more than two. I'm trying to imagine the scenario where you wanted to carry golf clubs with you onto an airplane, but only had two of them. Would you take your favorite two with you and check the rest?
I have to imagine the more-than-two rule is at the airlines' request. With more than two clubs, you're likely going to bring them in a full-size golf bag and they don't want those onboard for space reasons.
It's about time we started showing some courage again. A keychain multitool, one of the tiny Swiss Army knives, and the like simply are not credible weapons. To ban them simply isn't rational, and it's time that we as a society moved on from this trauma-by-proxy.
+1. I think they have made a fortune from selling Swiss Army Knifes that were attached to keys--it's very easy to forget removing those before heading through security. Anyway I've always thought that was much easier to make a quick weapon by breaking something made of a hard plastic that's allowed on board (e.g. lid of a laptop). In fact a solid enough pen can often be more dangerous than the tiny Swiss Army Knives because it is easier to grip and use in a more forceful way.
Great to hear that pool cues will be allowed again :D. Nothing annoys players more than having to checking their cues especially when they are really expensive.
Wait a second. They're allowing things other than "small knives" on the planes again. Could it be that the other things that are allowed on planes, ski poles, hockey sticks, etc might not be allowed it the "small blades" weren't allowed? For example, the pointy end of a pole, or a utility part of a tool. These things might have been disallowed by a sharp-pointy, but they're allowed back on, and it just so happens that the regulation of what's considered an "okay blade" and what's considered a "not-okay-blade" has to change because of that.
45 comments
[ 3.4 ms ] story [ 93.3 ms ] threadSometime they will test it, which involves holding a small trip of paper above the open container. I think that happened only once to me.
They are pretty lax most times if you have children along. You can take water through with kids (or at least I have several times), and they have always skipped any of the extra screening and scanning when I'm with my kids. We just walk right through the metal detector.
I see what you did there.
The TSA isn't exactly known for applying its rules (or anyone else's rules for that matter) consistently and accurately.
I, on the other hand, made the mistake of putting my toddler daughter in a party dress with a fluffy skirt which a TSA agent had to pat down to make sure there wasn't anything hiding in there. We weren't treated aggressively or anything like that. But the whole thing felt ridiculous.
Air travel is no party. We all fly in pants now.
Also, how about fucking liquids?
K-Y Jelly is fine if less than 3 ounces. If you need more than 3 ounces, well, maybe try leaving your hotel room occasionally.
It annoys me that several times I forgot that some particular item is forbidden and it got confiscated. Even jam!
The threat of hijacking is the reason planes get special treatment, but the combination of secure cockpit doors and the perception that hijacking will lead to the deaths of everyone on the plane makes gaining access to the cockpit effectively impossible regardless of the availability of weapons.
You could do just the same with a credit card with a sharpened edge on it. Maybe they'll ban amex & visa next?
My point is that banning items that could be used as weapons is not a particularly effective means of preventing hijacking.
I remember better days of air travel, when everyone felt a lot more carefree.
http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5216204
But on an issue like this, I have a lot of empathy for the flight attendants, and might sooner advocate for keeping my shoes on in the airport rather than again making it convenient to carry knives on board airplanes. With training, any device that can cut a pilot's or flight attendant's carotid artery can be used to take over a plane. Intelligence to stop the plots to take over airplanes from happening in the first place is an essential step in defense, but maybe leaving knives in checked baggage is another.
Sure, an attacker could kill people with a small knife, but killing and/or threatening passengers and flight attendants will not gain an attacker access to the cockpit. Everyone involved now assumes that a hijacker who gains access to the cockpit will try to crash the plane in to a building, so a significant portion of people will fight to the death against any attempt to enter the cockpit. I suspect everyone who would seriously contemplate hijacking a plane knows this and would not attempt a plan using only small knives.
That said, I want neither in carry-on.
The thing that keeps airplanes safe is the miniscule number of bad actors. That's about it. Unfortunately, that truth makes people feel insecure. Me? I'd fly even if there was no security at all. The odds are in favor of safety.
Cockpit door locks.
I don't like that association in my head.
The 9/11 attacks worked because historically, a hijacked plane would invariably be diverted to some far-flung airstrip and become a hostage situation. Anyone in such a situation understood that their risk of being killed was very low, so long as they complied with the hostage-takers. It took less than a day for passengers to realise that the risks of action and inaction had inverted, as we saw in the case of flight United 93.
The hijacking MO used on 9/11 was a one-time deal. Passengers now understand that rather than being safe so long as they comply with hijackers, they are doomed unless they fight back. As such, a knife on a plane is no more dangerous than a knife on a bus or a train - the attacker might injure or kill a handful of people, but they'll quickly be overwhelmed by sheer force of numbers.
It's for this reason that all subsequent terrorist plots against aviation have been bombs, with the intention of taking down the plane in flight.
Schneier has repeatedly pointed out this systematic failure in security thinking - responding to the last threat, rather than the next.
http://www.tsa.gov/sites/default/files/assets/pdf/tsa_permit...
I wonder if some Louisville politician lobbied for this change:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/telstar/309924706/
I understand why they think these knives are still an issue, but I think the training doctrine of "don't obey the hijackers" has changed all that.
Great to hear that pool cues will be allowed again :D. Nothing annoys players more than having to checking their cues especially when they are really expensive.