One would think that some fraction of those events was truthful, so yes that’s scary.
Guns and ammo are supposed to be declared when you check in. There’s that phrase again, supposed to be. The last time I flew, on my return flight I was very rushed - It was a family medically-urgent need for my return, and I changed to the earliest possible flight home. I barely got packed and to the airport in time.
Anyway when I checked in it was so late that I knew that if I followed the rules and declared, I would almost certainly miss my flight – it usually takes an extra 20-30 minutes for the process. So I didn’t declare. I checked my bag and made the flight. On board but we hadn’t pushed yet, I was a little nervous and was half expecting my name to be called and me being asked to de-plane.
It never happened. We flew as normally. When I got to SFO. after leaving the airport I checked inside my bag and sure enough there was a tag inside it saying my bag had been ‘randomly selected for opening and inspection’. Randomly, yeah right.
So in the end all worked out well for me. I got home and to the hospital in time, and the family member was okay. But I didn’t follow the process, and (I presume here) apparently my bag was screened and they saw what was inside, and they checked to ensure all was copacetic. Again, I presume.
But, did all of my fellow passengers know there were weapons on board their flight that hadn’t been properly declared and inspected? Very doubtful.
They missed my 1l tub of moisturiser though…
I actually had it sealed in a bag with the prescription (13 hour flight + severe eczema often triggered by air-con, I ain’t doing that without moisturiser) in the authorised manner, but they didn’t pick up it was there at all. This was shortly after the liquid ban was started.
Where were you people when I was traveling last month? I didn’t know TSA would mail items you accidently had on you.
I had a Buck multi-tool that was gifted to me ~fifteen years ago. Best knife I ever owned. LA missed it in my carry on, I kept it in a side pocket and hadn’t used it for a while. TSA in Atl found it, they never mentioned anything about shipping. It was early morning and I was brain fogged, hoping to avoid the prob-u-lator, I just said ‘crap’ an looked stunned. They kept the knife and waved me on.
Oh no, TSA doesn’t mail it for you. If you have time, and if they don’t insist on confiscating the item, some airports have a self-serve kiosk for you to self-mail the item.
Or another option: my brother got stopped for his pocket knife. He decided to take it to an empty airline counter where he snagged (“borrowed”) a roll of packing tape. He wrapped the knife in a sheet of paper, then he wrapped it with tape. He then went to an emptier area of the airport and taped the knife to the bottom of a luggage cart rental rack.
When he returned a few days later, the knife was still there. THIS is why you want to arrive at the airport 2 hours before your flight.
Every time I fly, the TSA allows me to board the plane with enough weapons to where I could kill / seriously injure several passengers before the rest of the mob-rushed me to the point where I couldn’t do anything else. And just like you, they go through the x-ray in my bag, in plain view.
I forgot a bottle of prescription cough syrup (new and full 8 oz) a few weeks ago. It was flagged and “tested” when the agent put the bottle unopened in a machine for about a minute and handed it back to me.
Well, I call them tools that, in an emergency like a crash, could come in handy. They’re in my pockets and so are on me and not in my carry-on. If another passenger were to go nuts they would help me subdue or repel them.
Once while traveling in civilian clothes I went all the way across the country with a box cutter in my knapsack. Forgot it was there and didn’t discover it until I was in my hotel room. I had gone through TSA at two airports that day.
And recently I was going through security at my base airport in uniform. They found my leatherman tool and decided to hassle me about it. Despite the fact that they knew perfectly well that I could go back outside, give it to one of our customer service agents, and very probably get it handed back to me on the other side. I also pointed out that there is an ax under my seat in the aircraft which would be much more effective should I decide to cause trouble.
Every time I begin leaning toward giving TSA some benefit of the doubt, things like that happen.
I’ve literally thrown a pocket knife attached to my keychain into the little bowl that goes through the x-ray machine and not even been searched after it made it through.
Which infuriates me that much more when they harass me about stupid stuff like whether or not gel deodorant should go in the clear plastic bag or not.
I did that four times (two round trips) prior to 9/11. The folks at Washington National showed a bit of concern at the knife in my carry-on but didn’t say anything; the folks in Texas didn’t seem to mind one bit.
Even more so than an axe, pilots inherently have available to them the deadliest “weapon” on the plane in their hands at all time. It’s called the control yoke. If the pilot wants to crash the plane, there’s not much that can be done!
I thought this went without saying, but of course you’re correct. And it’s the larger farce of our security system.
Another example of this silliness is access to airport ramp areas. As a pilot I cannot simply walk out to my airplane. I have to be buzzed out by an authorized person*. Who are these authorized people? Our gate agents, who at my airline are mostly college kids working their way through school. Which means that I, the pilot, who has an obvious need to access the ramp, must ask permission from a 20-something non-pilot to be let out there.
The security people see this as a sort of “need to know” or “need to be somewhere”. Not sure how they figured out that the pilots don’t have a need to access their aircraft.
I kid you not, this process involves scanning a badge, inputting a code and sticking their FINGER into a scanner. Lots of jokes about lube and electronic proctology around our gates.
I have one of these spiffy card knives. It lives in my messenger bag along with the T1 credit card tool kit. I also carry my medication bag that among other things has 2 or 4 epi pens, at least 1 vial of insulin, 14 syringes, 1 victoza pen and 7 tips, and a small bottle of colchicine [the pre-bullshit uncoated ones that will start dissolving in the back of ones throat.] I could with careful planning kill someone slowly with a serious overdose of colchicine slipped into a drink, or a double tap [one syringe, 50 units each in each hand] into the totally wrong spot for safety of insulin which would really not be good for a nondiabetic to get. Hm, I bet I could manage 2 syringes in each hand, the are slender enough…<evil grin>
I still say they should simply make the pilot compartment inaccessible from the passenger area, put a power bar and bottle of water in each seat back pouch and issue everybody a tazer on their way into the plane. Let the passengers duke it out with any hijackers.
