I hear about drunken drivers all the time - tell me, when someone offers to give you a ride in their car, do you make them take a breathalyzer test? If not, why not? Don’t you care about your personal safety? Fact is, LOTS more people are killed and maimed every year by intoxicated drivers than intoxicated pilots.
Who is going to pay for it? You? The taxpayers? The passengers?
Fact is, drunk/drugged pilots are a relatively minor problem in aviation. Yes, it happens - so do lightning strikes on golf courses and winning the lottery.
If you’re playing the “safety” card - shouldn’t we drug test every surgeon before every operation? Every auto mechanic before repairing a set of brakes? How about we just drug test everyone twice a day, hmmm?
As it is, pilots and flight crews (and it’s not JUST the pilots tested in these situations, but the attendants, too) are rendomly asked to pee into cups, in addition to (in the pilots’ case) doing so every 6 months during their regular physicals and any time there is ANY suspicion voiced about their sobriety. If EVERYONE starts demanding a drug/alcohol test prior to take off… well, the delays will increase, the costs will go up, and a lot of folks will quit aviation NOT because they have a “substance abuse problem” but because they are tired of the presumption of guilt.
But - have it your way. Anything in the name of safety. I’m sure you’ll agree that banning alcohol service to the passengers and drug testing everyone prior to boarding will cut down on air rage and improve safety and comfort. We could combine it with the strip-search security so you can piss in a cup in full view of everyone else being groped by “security”.
Let’s clarify that a bit. You give up those rights when you fly the airlines.
If you wish to charter a plane you can carry “arms” on board (done all the time with charters for hunting and fishing trips) and searches are at the discretion of the pilot(s) and/or charter company.
And on my airplane I’ll even tolerate jokes (up to a point) if you don’t mind me muttering about inverted flight and whacking you unconcious if I feel the need.
This is why a lot of companies are now buying jets, or fractions of jets, or chartering aircraft for their employees - to avoid the airline delays and searches.
Of course, the non-rich public riding the cattle cars gets screwed. As usual.
But don’t feel too bad - the airlines are lobbying in DC like made to get the same “security” nonsense applied not only to charters but even two-seat piece of shit Cessnas flying in the Alaska wilds. Soon enough, aviation will collapse, killed by regulation and paranoia.
That sound? Wilbur and Orville spinning in their graves…
Broomstick, as I stated above, these pilots are responsible for the safety of HUNDREDS of people, daily. None of the other careers you mentioned can kill that many people with one accident. Please don’t play “slippery slope” with me- I’ve got a teflon-coated sled, and I’m not afraid to use it.
Several people have gotten into trouble for even commenting on the sobriety of their pilots. If it’s such a big deal for the airlines, why not spend the few dollars it would take for the pilots to perform a breathalyzer test before each flight? A breathalyzer test is cheap and fast, and reasonably accurate- I’d be willing to have that extra cost worked into the cost of my ticket. Many jobs require drug tests- and these are for positions in which the employee’s safety is the only one at risk.
I don’t know if you’ve been paying attention lately, but air passengers are already effectively presumed guilty. Why can’t we ask if our pilots- the ones quite literally holding our lives in their hands- are safe to fly? The airlines could avoid the negative publicity of these sorts of situations if they could say, “Results of the pilot’s breathalyzer test is available to any customer upon request”, rather than delaying the flight (as in my friend’s case), or pressing charges (as in the OP). Hell, this way they’d be able to avoid any embarassing “drunk pilot” stories.
And please, before you exaggerate further- I’m NOT saying that the entire crew be drug tested before each flight. The only thing I’m suggesting is that the two-to-three people actually in charge of the flight take a breathalyzer test. Hell, just have the damn thing on the plane, so they don’t have to DELAY THE FLIGHT FOR TWO HOURS WHILE THEY GO GET ONE if someone questions their sobriety.
Too bad it was a security guard, and not a passenger that noticed the scent of alcohol on a Delta Co-Pilot today. Would have been interesting to see if another passenger would have gotten the treatment people in this thread are saying he would have gotten.
Yes, but it only detects alcohol. It will not pick up anything else, either legal or illegal, that can impair piloting. What cheap, fast, accurate test do you propose to pick not only alcohol, not only the major illegal drugs, but also every over-the-counter remedy that screws up a pilot’s skills? Just off the top of my head - many blood pressure medications, at least one medication heavily promoted to help people quit smoking, the coedine frequently prescribed for dental work and Zyrtec are all forbidden to pilots, even when prescribed by a doctor. Sudafed has been implicated in several helicoptor crashes. Benadryl, Nyquil, and many cough syrups are likewise forbidden to pilots even through they’re over-the-counter… Back when I worked in the “addiction recovery” field our most simple drug test cost $25 a pop and detected only five broad categories of drugs. The tests we had to detect any and everything started at $125 a throw and required a couple days for results to be returned. Granted, that was 15 years ago, now, and perhaps the technology has advanced. But the cost is real.
If you’re serious about this safety tactic, testing for JUST alcohol is not enough.
Yes, I know. That’s why I don’t fly the airlines anymore.
You can. But what consistutes a stamp of “safety?” Alright, certify the flight crew is sober… what next? You want the results of the pilot(s) most recent checkride, too? How about his automobile driving record? His medical records made public? Anything else you want to know?
By the way - a chronically fatigued pilot is just as dangerous as a drunk one. How about we clean up some of the rules regarding length of duty and rest? Oh wait - we’ve tried that. The airlines scream about costs. Passengers scream because of delays when a fresh crew needs to be found to replace one nearing the end of permitted duty… but chronic sleep deprevation is OK, I guees. Never mind the pilot falling asleep at the controls on landing, as long as he’s not drunk or drugged, right?
But if you do that - same thing for the guys driving semis on the freeways, the greyhound bus drivers, the doctors, the ambulance drivers, the cops, the firefighters… everyone else who is responsible for the safety of others.
Never said you said such a thing. It just so happens that that IS the current policy. If there is suspicion of drug/alcohol use the entire crew, flight attendants as well as pilots, are tested. All of them. That is the current policy.
The FAA has a long history of imposing additional rules, but almost never retreats. If they demand the comprehensive testing of pilots you suggest the flight attendants will be subject to the same treatment as well. After all, if the pilots DO fuck up, it’s the FA’s who are supposed to drag your ass off the burning airplane. Hard to do that when their drunk or high, yes?
Just a little nitpick. This is one, and only one, person in charge of an airplane flight. That person is probably called “the pilot in command” or PIC, but is often referred to as “the captain”. An airplane in flight is not a democracy. Yes, each crew member has a role to play and contributes to the success or failure of the enterprise, but it’s the captain who is “in charge” and bear responsibility for everything that happens aboard.
There’s a quality control problem in how the airlines enforce FAA safety and security regulations.
Yeah, there is. There’s also a quality control problem with how the US Legal system determines guilt and sentencing. Forgive me, but I think that’s a bigger problem with infringement of rights than some passenger who voluntarily wavied their rights for a few hours to partake in the services that the airline provides.
The guy was just joking, why is the pentalty so harsh?
Because that’s not the sort of joke that the airlines want the passengers to be making. Harsh penalties send a message to every one else who might be tempted to make a joke. No one jokes with the local Mafioso how the “Family Buisness” is doing.
Doesn’t accusing a passenger who raises a question discourage people from raising a question?
Perhaps, but I’m pretty sure if a pilot is seriously impared, passengers would rather speak up and risk possible jail time then put themselves at risk. This also discourages an organized group from trying to use questions of pilot fitness to cause mass groundings.
This “safety” regulation doesn’t really protect anyone.
As far as the passengers, maybe not. In all reality, an airline that is strict in it’s enforcement of the regulation is trying to protect themselves from appearing negligent. Overkill perhaps, but I know I feel safer knowing that airlines deal with potentially impared pilots in this method, rather than using the Catholic Church’s method of dealing with potentially pedophilic Priests.
I wonder if they hadn’t cleared that commuter flight, how many of the passengers would have complained about it when they heard about the Delta co-pilot today.
This is the second time you’ve used this argument and it’s not any more valid this time. Either you have the freedom to speak up or you don’t. Jail is for criminals. People don’t generally risk possible jail time for the chance to be the big hero that caught someone breaking the rules. Suppose I’m a seasoned traveller who thinks my pilot might be impaired in some way. Do I say something and go to jail, or do I risk letting the impaired pilot fly the plane? After all, we might get there in one piece.
And how, exactly does it discourage an organized group from trying to cause mass groundings? It was hard for those people to hijack the planes and fly them into the buildings last year. If I had some suicidal recruits and I wanted to destroy air travel in America, I could give them some slow-acting poison and have them go to the airport and accuse pilots of drinking. It’s that simple! Easy as pie! They get to avoid jail time and go to paradise and nobody ever gets to their destination on time again!
Like “Fire!” in a crowded theater? I know it’s been raised, but I’m just pointing it out to you in regard to this quote - it’s obvious that the first amendment can and has been abridged in the past. Whether the incident on the plane constitutes such a time is up to the FAA and other regulatory agencies to decide (which, it seems, they have, as evidenced by the fine this guy received).
Out of interest, if I actually do smell (or think I smell) alcohol on the pilots breath, what should I do? Now I’d be too scared to dare mention it, in case I find myself facing prosecution.
I think it’s going to take more people refusing to fly before anything gets done about these problems. A mass boycott would be an excellent idea, but people would have to be willing to endure some discomfort in order for that to work.
The airlines treat their customers like shit, and we need to show them that behavior such as theirs is unacceptable.
Well, probably because we don’t automatically cede all of our rights just because we enter into voluntary actions, especially when the constructs of those actions are put in place by the government.
This is true to an extent – however, what we have in each of those instances is something decidedly different.
In this case and others like it, the “offending” passengers have been arrested for “disorderly conduct” when any disorder resultant from their conduct – non-threatening, non-inflammatory speech – has been a result of government regulation and airline policy and people applying those regulations/policies blindly and in a couple of cases, a considered lack of organization.
In effect, people are being made responsible for actions wholly outside of their control, actions that they could not necessarily foresee. It’s rather like arresting someone because they jokingly told a friend “Oh, there’s a bee on you!” which caused the friend (who, unbeknownst to the joker, had a violent bee-phobia) to panic, run out into the street and cause a three car near accident with all the cars’ drivers out on the street screaming and yelling and blocking the road when no damage was done and no one was hurt.
To use a slightly clumsier analogy, if the passenger is the quarterback and the joke is the football, there’s no way of knowing if it will be intercepted, fumbled or run in all the way to the end zone. If it’s fumbled, that’s the receiver’s problem, not the QBs.
Fortunately, there’s no law against being a moron, even a goddamned one. And there is a sight of a difference between a joking threat to passenger safety, especially a terrorism-related safety issue which can’t be easily proven/disproven to be a joke (i.e. “It’s a good thing I left my bomb at home.”) and a joke about passenger safety like “Gee, I hope he isn’t drunk!” which can be easily knocked down by asking one simple follow-up question: “Sir, do you have reason to believe the pilot is impaired, or was that a rhetorical comment?”
And glossing over the “appearance of negligence” is important enough to elevate offhanded, if ill-advised, comments to the level of criminal conduct?
Oooh, nice straw man. And frankly, I’m glad that you get a nice warm feeling of safety by jokers being put off of airplanes and turned into criminals. I feel like I and every other member of the flying public is being sold a bill of goods. This isn’t about keeping us safe, this is about looking tough. This is more of the grand “things are safer now, we’ve learned our lesson” illusion that can only be controlled so long as anything in any way out of the ordinary is quashed, even when it has absolutely no direct bearing on anyone’s safety – and even when it might have actually enhanced someone’s safety.
Again let me state that you don’t cede ***ALL * your rights when you fly on the airlines. I’ve listed specific rights that in my experience that you are expected to wave when you step foot on an airliner. If you’re going to persist in saying all rights are waived, you’re going to have to defend that view better.
This situation makes me uncomfortable on several levels, but mostly projecting what coulda happened if my mother were still alive. See, I could see her asking exactly this question, in all honesty and nervousness.
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she was an uneasy flyer at the best of times; avid traveller but antsy about flying.
she was a new junkie; the woman read 2 (real) newspapers per day, front to back.
she had a real terror of alcohol. Her dad was a drunk and she never got over the experience.
she was an upright, old lady schoolteacher in the habit of asking for information she wanted, and expecting answers. She was unfailingly polite about it, btw.
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If she had to fly even several years after the drunk-pilots scandal, I would have thoroughly expected her to ask someone in the crew about it. The woman would strike up a conversation with anyone. She would have regarded it as a chance for reassurance AND to exchange a few words with that nice young cabin attendant or whomever.
She would have been just that sincere and innocent.
I realize airlines have to make and enforce rules crafted to deal with the lowest public common denominator. (And that’s pretty damned low, even excluding terrorists.) I just really hate the thought that she could have pulled off a plane in humiliation and arrested simply for asking reasurrance.
As a consumer I’m more than disquieted that airlines have effectively placed legitimate safety issues beyond even inquiry from their customers. IMO the onus is on the airlines. In this day when file clerks can be randomly forced to piss in bottles to keep their jobs, why not require and publicize that every pilot had bottle-pissed before checking in? During the pre-flight emergency procedures lecture, why not add, "This craft is a Boeing Pregnant Gooney and it’s last safety inspection/ service overhaul was on whenever?
It’d just make sense to be a lot less defensive and a lot more proactive, instead of treating the entire flying public like borderline criminals.
Veb, your mother, if she’d asked in a polite, straightforward way, probably wouldn’t have been subjected to such treatment. I’m gathering that part of the reason this guy was “made an example of” was because he was joking around about a serious subject. (At least, that’s how I’m reading into it - I could be wrong.)
A question was asked. The person did not make an accusation.
Yeah, it should be obvious that there are to be no jokes about bombs and guns, but what if one is on a short small flight that goes from a tiny remote airport to the hunting camp. Does that person get the full cavity search if they ask if they can bring thier hunting rifle on board?
Man I HATE doing this, it is my first time for this—CITE for evacuation and arrest when a passenger asks a question.
FTR- according to the article, the guy never asked a question, he made a statement in jest. I would like to see a copy and a cite of the FAA rule he supposedly broke. Then, I’d like to see him sue the airline, the FAA, and John Ashcroft for violating his constitutional rights. We need someone with brass balls and deep pockets to take this all the way to the Supreme if necessary. Whether or not they [SC] would actually follow the spirit and letter of the Constitution is in question, of course, given recent decisions.
Security or no, I think this ridiculous. There is no way in my mind that what he said could be in any way construed as “threatening” to the security of the passengers, crew or plane. I’ve read this thread thoroughly and I don’t see any argument that convinces me it can be construed as such. Depending on what the FAA reg actually says, I may be able to understand the airlines reaction in the face of federal consequences, but that doesn’t make the reg okay. It just means they are following an obviously unconstitutional rule set by a federal agency. This is clearly a free speech issue, IMHO.
I most certainly will not defend that view because it has never been my contention from the beginning of this thread!! Quite the opposite, in fact, my point has been that our right to speak freely is not waived to the extent that simply using speech which is not inherently or even unintentionally threatening to anyone’s safety can be treated as a criminal act.
One more time for those who still ain’t getting it: Nothing about getting on an airplane should make it illegal to say something which isn’t dangerous or threatening.
That isn’t just a free speech issue, it’s a common sense issue.
The threat hanging over this guy’s head is a federal charge of “Interfering with a flight crew” which is dealt with by US Code Title 49 Section 46504:
The question is whether or not jokingly (or even seriously) making some reference to a pilot’s sobriety is an assault or intimidation. (Hint: assault is out by definition. Only intimidation may come into play, and even that is rather damned iffy by federal precedent.)
Discounting pregnant Irishwomen who get on an El Al Flight, and have their boyfriends try and smuggle a bomb in iwth their luggage, how many pregnant terrorists are there?
What use is it to increase security to prevent another 9/11, only to find that pregnant women and Grannies are among the most routinely searched?
Why are so many tools getting jobs as security screeners?
Why are nailfiles so contraband, yet guns and knives still find their way onto planes?
And how do you manage to conceal a bomb inside baby bottles filles with formula, without poisoning the baby?