Tidings Of Comfort & Joy

[redbrunja]

 After the failed Northwest Airlines bombing, the TSA tightened up its regulations, requiring that all flights in the US and coming to the US had every passenger patted down prior to boarding and carry only one item onboard, which will be searched by hand prior to boarding. Additionally, during the last hour of the flight, passengers are not allowed to leave their seats, access their luggage, or use handheld electronics, and must sit with their hands in plain view.

What this tells me is that the TSA is fairly clueless on how to keep travelers safe.

I am all for bumping up safety when attacks or threats happen; but the epic delays and cancellations that occurred when these new restrictions came into effect leads me to infer that the TSA does not have the infrastructure to deal with threats, which is ridiculous when you realize they have had nine years since September 11th.

And as for keeping your hands in sight and not using electronics during the last hour – frankly, that is treating people like criminals. I have a very emotional reaction to this; all I can think about is that after paying for an expensive ticket, taking an abnormal amount of time to prove that you are a.) who you say you are and b.) safe to have on a plane, you are treated like a prisoner being transported from one jail to another.

Furthermore, all it seems to do is show that the TSA safety procedures do not work. Or the TSA doesn't have faith that they do, if they think that after going through three different screening processes, they still believe there is a reasonable probability that passengers are carrying hazardous materials.

Finally, I have a huge problem with how mum the TSA is being about why they tightened restrictions and even WHAT the tightened restrictions are. One of the callers on NPR today flew in from Charles de Galle and commented that if he hadn't been a journalist and had access to the wires, he wouldn't have know what was going on.

Comments

[sureasdawn.livejournal.com]

I tend to agree with my husband that all security is an illusion.

The TSA does not have and has never had the resources to adequately police the airline industry. It's going to come down to either all flying is halted indefinitely for being too unsafe or people are going to have to go on planes wearing airline-provided jumpsuits and no baggage at all. It's that absurd.

Guess what, you take one thing away, the people willing to harm others are going to find another way around it. I fully believe that there is no way to stop certain people until they demonstrate their intent to kill.

I really wish the TSA were transparent enough to actually give out some statistics on how effective they've been. All I see from them is hassling innocent people, thieving from the people they're supposed to be protecting and making themselves look like fools.

[redbrunja.livejournal.com]

I agree.

At this point, part of me is tempted to go 'just screw the security and have us get on the planes fast, and we'll all just take our chances.'

I really wish the TSA were transparent enough to actually give out some statistics on how effective they've been. All I see from them is hassling innocent people, thieving from the people they're supposed to be protecting and making themselves look like fools.

*nods* That is one of the major things that pisses me off - the lack of accountability.