There’s new word today about what new restrictions will be forthcoming in wake of the Detroit airline terrorism incident:
Really? For the last hour of the flight, I can’t read my paperback? Drink water? Change a baby even if I were allowed to access the diaper bag (note: I do not currently have a baby, but have traveled with them)? All passengers must sit still and stare at the seatback in front of them? I suppose I can look out the window, if I have a window seat. Or socialize with that sweaty sprocket salesman in the middle seat, what the hell.
I’m hoping this will not be the rule domestically, but I’m not optimistic:
So, yeah, I’m guessing for at least some limited period (perhaps indefinitely) these will be the rules on all flights, lockdown during the final hour. I suppose this is better than being killed by some clown who self-immolates during final approach. What about the guy that does so 70 minutes before landing?
Really, the only thing that pains, me if a paperback is a “personal item” under these rules, is not having reading material. I’ll bet the airline will step up and sell me a newspaper or novel in-flight that is fully inspected (and fire-retardant!), for the paltry sum of $35.
If the TSA shows sanity and limits these rules to foreign flights… well, mine becomes a lame rant, but I still think its silly for those flights from Vancouver to LA to put up with this crap.
I also neglected the joke that TSA currently makes us take off our shoes in the security lines. Given yesterday’s events, must we now take off our pants and place them in the scanner? This seems absurd, but its also what would have caught that guy. And its still absurd.
I just KNEW the TSA assholes would use this as an excuse to further bully passengers at security checkpoints. It’s getting to the point that I might not fly anymore.
A friend told me about this earlier and my immediate reaction was that this is treating the symptom, not the disease.
The problem isn’t that homie had the ability to do something on his lap- in this case build a bomb; the problem is that the guy was able to get bomb components on the plane in the first place. I mean, JFC, I can’t even bring my lipgloss on a plane without getting on a no fly list and this mother fucker can walk on with bomb parts? Fuck. That. Noise.
See, when air travel is down, what better way to drum up business than adding more draconian measures! I can’t wait for the day when someone smuggles a bomb aboard a plane in their rectum. After the TSA orders cavity searches at random maybe the public will finally get sick of this dog-and-pony-show bullshit.
If ran Al Queda this would be my plan. Find one expendable idiot to attack a flight in the most asinine way possible and every American gets punished for it for years to come by our own Government. You don’t need the plan to be sucessful or even remotely workable. For a few hundred dollars, including the cost of the ticket, you get the media to spread your fear, the TSA to punish the innocent and the American Government gets all of the blame.
I’ve always disliked flying anyway, even before my IBD showed itself, even when I was slender and healthy and not prone to any sorts of problems. Flying just has never appealed to me, except as a way to avoid spending a LOT of time on the road.
Now, though, with the newest regulations, it’s starting to look like it would take less time to drive 500 miles, rather than spend the time making reservations, getting to the airport early, waiting in line (barefooted), getting someone to go through my purse and give me the Evil Eye because I dare to take my medicine and syringes on the plane, flying to my destination, and then waiting for my luggage.
The airlines need to make flying MORE pleasant, and MORE convenient, rather than making it more burdensome. I read about the new regulations that say that airlines can keep passengers cooped up on the runway for no more than three hours now. The airlines say that this is an incredible burden for them. I say that the airlines should figure out some way to warehouse their passengers other than on the frigging plane.
Eventually, what will happen is that once you are checked by security, you are strapped onto a dolly like this, and then rolled onto the plane. Airlines will be able to pack you in like chickens in a poultry farm thus having more passengers per square foot. Business and first class get optional catheters and drink tubes like in a hamster cage. As you won’t be able to take any carry on baggage (as I’ve read is recommended by some airlines), all the choice items you’d want to take with you on the planes will be available to the baggage handlers, thus making them happy and keeping union issues to a minimum. Everyone wins!
No more American planes coming from international departures flying over Canada.
I don’t much care for or about this sort of problem we manufacture for ourselves. There are a number of better ways to travel if we just took the time to enjoy them.
Gawd, almost as asine as all the other useless security shit we go through to make our flights “safer.” Lock the cockpit already, no unattended bags, and screen people for obvious weapons.
Well, since this was thwarted by some Dutch bastard getting out of his seat, what bloody sense does it make period?
[quoteIf the TSA shows sanity and limits these rules to foreign flights… well, mine becomes a lame rant, but I still think its silly for those flights from Vancouver to LA to put up with this crap.[/QUOTE]
Even foreign flights to the US, what fucking sense does this make?
And banning electronics???
As far as I can tell, the git set his own fucking genitals on fire, and harmed essentially nothing but his own nuts (good, stupid fucker), what the hell sense
Indeed, upcoming, for all flights to the US, US Gov’t approved Adult Diapers, only issued from secure US Gov approved Diaper facilities!
See above.
Or even better, all travellers to the US should be sedated for the duration of their flight…
I rather fear that in fact the US public will applaud being “protected” and gleefully submit to cavity searches.
Bingo, two winners.
The US has now spent what, ten years rule by hysteria?
I am no bomb or plane expert, but if you have a small, crappy bomb that gets blown up on a plane, isnt it statistically SAFER that the bomb be blown up as late as possible? The higher and further you are from landing, it seems to me that increases the likelyhood of a survival problem becoming a non survivable one.
Nope, they’ll just make everyone strip completely naked, and then force them to take a sedative. Once the passengers are knocked out, the baggage handlers will layer the bodies onto pallets and load them on to the plane with a forklift.
