# What does "real" airline security look like? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [November 16, 2010, 7:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-real-airline-security-look-like/560903 "2010-11-16T19:56:26Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Steve\_MB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steve_mb/32/5339_2.png) [@Steve\_MB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steve_MB)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2010, 2:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-real-airline-security-look-like/560903/41 "2010-11-18T02:55:42Z")
> [@Mr\_Smashy](#): > > I’m looking for a cite that says TSA procedures has not done any good since 9/11. None. Terrorists smuggling weapons onto planes despite TSA security dinner theater? Yes (Richard Reid, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab) Terrorists actually prevented from getting weapons onto plane? No Game, set, match. ---
**Author:** ![Ravenman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ravenman/32/2929_2.png) [@Ravenman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ravenman)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2010, 3:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-real-airline-security-look-like/560903/42 "2010-11-18T03:57:33Z")
So, the consensus seems to be that to not have security theater, we need a few thousand bomb detecting dogs and El Al like spending on more, smarter airport screeners, and an additional $65 billion each year to support this new strategy? If we seem to average about one serious threat to an airliner about every two or three years, does it really make sense to spend $140-$210 billion to prevent each one of those threats? ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2010, 6:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-real-airline-security-look-like/560903/43 "2010-11-18T06:26:46Z")
Quoth **Whack-a-Mole** : > [@](#): > > I’ve seen videos of them catching fire and one that sort of exploded but nothing that I think would damage an airplane. Those are accidental overheatings, or simulations of the conditions in same. You could get more dramatic effects from a direct short. Plus, imagine a half-dozen terrorists or so, each one carrying a laptop and a spare battery, and then putting them all together. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2010, 2:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-real-airline-security-look-like/560903/44 "2010-11-18T14:27:56Z")
> [@Ravenman](#): > > If we seem to average about one serious threat to an airliner about every two or three years, does it really make sense to spend $140-$210 billion to prevent each one of those threats? No. More people are killed on the highways every ten minutes than are killed in aircraft in any given year. ---
**Author:** ![Ravenman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ravenman/32/2929_2.png) [@Ravenman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ravenman)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2010, 2:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-real-airline-security-look-like/560903/45 "2010-11-18T14:35:05Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > No. More people are killed on the highways every ten minutes than are killed in aircraft in any given year. So wouldn’t that tend to mean that, other than perhaps making a few needed tweaks to various policies, the “security theater” that people like to criticize is pretty much what the people want? If we aren’t willing to pay a lot more money to get “real” security when relatively few lives are threatened each year, it seems this porridge is not too hot, not too cold, and might be just about right. ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2010, 2:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-real-airline-security-look-like/560903/46 "2010-11-18T14:45:25Z")
> [@AK84](#): > > Ok I am no defender of the TSA. But what happens in Israel is impractical in the US. The US is the center of world commerce and travel. You start giving out discretion at a lower level and the whole thing collapses. You can exersize discretion etc etc in small enviroments like Israel. Not so in the US where if you start making individual decisions about everyone, the whole system will collapse. BCN and MAD are two of the busiest airports in the world, but the cops running security there are expected and able to make their own decisions about whether a can of foiegras is dangerous or not. Mind you: they’re actual cops. There are rentacops, but those are not running the scanners. And, like Israeli airports but unlike American ones, Spanish airports are built around and for security. ETA: btw, you can buy what’s needed to make a bomb and carry it into an airplane very easily _after_ security, specially given rules like “gas lighters aren’t allowable at all, zippos must be in carryon”. Eeeeh… very, uh, logical. In another universe. ---
**Author:** ![Kearsen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/82dd89/32.png) [@Kearsen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kearsen)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2010, 3:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-real-airline-security-look-like/560903/47 "2010-11-18T15:11:09Z")
It was brought up and discarded once already but what we really need to do is start profiling passengers. Plenty or time before arriving at the airport that any people flying could have background checks run and go from there. ---
**Author:** ![Smitty](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e274bd/32.png) [@Smitty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smitty)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2010, 4:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-real-airline-security-look-like/560903/48 "2010-11-18T16:30:30Z")
> [@Steve\_MB](#): > > Because the US is less than six to ten times the size of Israel… oh, wait… And you think LAX is the only airport in America? News flash, Israel has 31 airports. The US has 14,000. Do the math, if you can. ---
**Author:** ![Omar\_Little](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/omar_little/32/269_2.png) [@Omar\_Little](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Omar_Little)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2010, 4:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-real-airline-security-look-like/560903/49 "2010-11-18T16:41:11Z")
> [@Kearsen](#): > > It was brought up and discarded once already but what we really need to do is start profiling passengers. Plenty or time before arriving at the airport that any people flying could have background checks run and go from there. I agree. If you meet the profile, well, sorry, it sucks to be you. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2010, 4:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-real-airline-security-look-like/560903/50 "2010-11-18T16:43:18Z")
> [@Ravenman](#): > > So wouldn’t that tend to mean that, other than perhaps making a few needed tweaks to various policies, the “security theater” that people like to criticize is pretty much what the people want? If we aren’t willing to pay a lot more money to get “real” security when relatively few lives are threatened each year, it seems this porridge is not too hot, not too cold, and might be just about right. We can do security theater much more efficiently and cheaply, though. The present situation is a mix of show and go, and neither is done properly. [QUOTE=Wilbo523] I agree. If you meet the profile, well, sorry, it sucks to be you. [/QUOTE] Are you a male between the ages of 19 and 44? Bend over. ---
**Author:** ![This\_Just\_In\_2](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/bbe5ce/32.png) [@This\_Just\_In\_2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/This_Just_In_2)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2010, 4:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-real-airline-security-look-like/560903/51 "2010-11-18T16:49:52Z")
> [@Smitty](#): > > And you think LAX is the only airport in America? News flash, Israel has 31 airports. The US has 14,000. Do the math, if you can. OK, lets do some math: 599: [Airports certificated to serve commercial air carrier aircraft with nine or more seats.](http://www.usatoday.com/travel/flights/2006-09-26-airport-numbers_x.htm) 7: [Airports with scheduled flights in Isreal](http://www.airgorilla.com/airports/asia/israel/) 7,653,600: [Population of Isreal](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isreal) 310,729,000: [Population of USA](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usa) USA has 40.6 times the population of Isreal, and 85 times more commercial airports. So we might need roughly double the number of inspectors. I’m tired of the misinformation regarding this. It seems to me very possible for the US to implement effective screening. Make being a screener a respectable well paid job and get rid of all the TSA know nothings. ---
**Author:** ![Steve\_MB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steve_mb/32/5339_2.png) [@Steve\_MB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steve_MB)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2010, 4:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-real-airline-security-look-like/560903/52 "2010-11-18T16:54:59Z")
> [@Smitty](#): > > The US has 14,000. [The list](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_airports_in_the_United_States) looks… rather shorter than that. Sorry, you don’t get to count every cow patch where Gus the Crop-Duster touched down once. ---
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2010, 5:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-real-airline-security-look-like/560903/53 "2010-11-18T17:08:30Z")
To be fair, of those eight Israeli airports, only two can handle jets, and only one of those two can handle anything bigger than a 757. The others are just local airfields, for domestic prop flights. ---
**Author:** ![Dinsdale](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/97f17d/32.png) [@Dinsdale](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dinsdale)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2010, 9:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-real-airline-security-look-like/560903/54 "2010-11-18T21:28:04Z")
> [@msmith537](#): > > Airline security isn’t going away. But you know what? I don’t want “real” security. I am perfectly content with the metal dectectors and random air marshals that screen out 99.9% of the morons who would otherwise bring a gun or knife onto an airplane. I am not worried about the .1%, 1 in a million event where an evil mastermind meticulously plans and executes the takeover of a plane Passenter 57 style. > > What I want is to not be inconvenienced or have to suffer the rudness of some TSA moron who they just hired from Burger King or Kinkos or wherever the heck they get these people from. This I agree with wholeheartedly. It seems odd to even attempt complete 100% security with airline passengers and luggage, when at just about every airport someone with the proper weapon could pull to the shoulder of a public road at the end of a runway… I don’t know if terrorists are fixated so heavily on airflight, when there are so may far softer targets readily available. Sure, a bomb, rocket, or weapons fire in a train station, sports arena, or crowded commuter tunnel might not have quite the impact of bringing down an airpane, but when you factor in the far greater likelihood of success, I woud have to think they would have at least SOME appeal to SOME terrorist. Yet we have not seen them. Are terrorists that irrational? Does anyone know where to find an accounting of TSA’s efforts, in terms of cost for various actions, and they types of event each level of effort is intended/expected to prevent? For example, these new scanners. How much will they cost over what is currently being done, and huch much safer is it expected to make us? Heck, you can even add in the value of time lost while going through security. I’m sure I wil be called crass and worse for suggesting a price can be placed on human life. But if 99.9% of all airline bombings can be prevented by efforts costing $X, I think it is legitimate to question whether it is worth spending many time $X in an attempt to eliminate that remaining .1%. But it seems that at least a good number of people feel that NO expense is too great, if there is the smales possibility of it removing ANY possible risk. I consider such thinking wasteful, and representative of much of what is worst about America. ---
**Author:** ![Dinsdale](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/97f17d/32.png) [@Dinsdale](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dinsdale)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2010, 9:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-real-airline-security-look-like/560903/55 "2010-11-18T21:35:54Z")
While I’m advocating an economic approach, is there any way to calculate the probable “cost” of a plane going down - for whatever reason? Planes occasionally crash due to factors other than terrorism. If we were somehow able to establish that a certain level of security was “reasonable”, and that individual travellers accept some portion of the risk for activity such security does not detect/prevent, it could have the effect of capping liability. WAG - lets say a plane worth $50 million crashes, with 300 passengers. Say each of those passsengers’ estates gets $5 million. So there is a cost of $1.55 billion. Add in damage to anything/one on the ground, but assume the cockpit door prevented hijacking into a building. At least we could come up with a dollar amount against which to weigh attempts to prevent such from occurring. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2010, 9:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-real-airline-security-look-like/560903/56 "2010-11-18T21:50:49Z")
> [@](#): > > I’m sure I wil be called crass and worse for suggesting a price can be placed on human life. Probably, but people put prices on human lives all the time, and in fact it can’t be avoided. You name any human activity at all, and there’s going to be some way to make it safer, at the cost of raising the monetary price. We’ve already decided that we’re not willing to pay $X more for a safer car that would save Y lives, or for safer houses, or whatever. The decision to not pay more for safer air travel is exactly the same sort of decision, and should be decided on the same criteria. ---
**Author:** ![theR](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/977dab/32.png) [@theR](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/theR)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2010, 10:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-real-airline-security-look-like/560903/57 "2010-11-18T22:15:43Z")
> [@This\_Just\_In\_2](#): > > OK, lets do some math: > > 599: [Airports certificated to serve commercial air carrier aircraft with nine or more seats.](http://www.usatoday.com/travel/flights/2006-09-26-airport-numbers_x.htm) > 7: [Airports with scheduled flights in Isreal](http://www.airgorilla.com/airports/asia/israel/) > > 7,653,600: [Population of Isreal](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isreal) > 310,729,000: [Population of USA](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usa) > USA has 40.6 times the population of Isreal, and 85 times more commercial airports. So we might need roughly double the number of inspectors. > > I’m tired of the misinformation regarding this. It seems to me very possible for the US to implement effective screening. Make being a screener a respectable well paid job and get rid of all the TSA know nothings. I bet there are more than 85 times the number of commercial flights. Air traffic controllers manage approximately 27,000 commercial flights per day in the USA, which is only 33% of total daily flights managed. [http://www.natca.org/100years/index.html](http://www.natca.org/100years/index.html) (Flash – you have to click on “In the Sky” then “Airport Congestion.”) ---
**Author:** ![theR](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/977dab/32.png) [@theR](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/theR)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2010, 10:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-real-airline-security-look-like/560903/58 "2010-11-18T22:20:10Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > Probably, but people put prices on human lives all the time, and in fact it can’t be avoided. You name any human activity at all, and there’s going to be some way to make it safer, at the cost of raising the monetary price. We’ve already decided that we’re not willing to pay $X more for a safer car that would save Y lives, or for safer houses, or whatever. The decision to not pay more for safer air travel is exactly the same sort of decision, and should be decided on the same criteria. This is exactly true. All security needs a cost/benefit analysis, and while we have “conventional wisdom” telling us that the increased security measures bring a benefit in the form risk reduction, I would love to see actual data to back it up. I probably would still not be convinced that the risk reduction was worth the absurd costs, in both pure dollars and other fuzzy factors like convenience and emotional distress, but I am extremely doubtful about the effectiveness of all the changes in airport security since 9/11/2001. Many security experts, both inside and outside the transportation industry, have voiced similar opinions with lots of supporting arguments. ---
**Author:** ![Icarus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/icarus/32/72_2.png) [@Icarus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Icarus)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2010, 10:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-real-airline-security-look-like/560903/59 "2010-11-18T22:42:22Z")
> [@theR](#): > > This is exactly true. All security needs a cost/benefit analysis, and while we have “conventional wisdom” telling us that the increased security measures bring a benefit in the form risk reduction, I would love to see actual data to back it up. I probably would still not be convinced that the risk reduction was worth the absurd costs, in both pure dollars and other fuzzy factors like convenience and emotional distress, but I am extremely doubtful about the effectiveness of all the changes in airport security since 9/11/2001. Many security experts, both inside and outside the transportation industry, have voiced similar opinions with lots of supporting arguments. You will never get answers to these quesitons because “Security” has become a new religion - we must take it all on faith. Security experts are the new priesthood, keeping us in place with scary stories of what will happen to us if we don’t follow their dictates. And, just like any religion, there is gold to be harvested in the process - just come up with a new and supposedly better scanning whatnot and sell it to the taxpayers - but first make sure they’re good and frightened by the invisible threat! ---
**Author:** ![YogSothoth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/8edcca/32.png) [@YogSothoth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/YogSothoth)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2010, 11:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-real-airline-security-look-like/560903/60 "2010-11-18T23:44:11Z")
A little bit cynical, but the only way airport security can work is if we accept a certain amount of losses per year as the cost of freedom. If someone sneaks in a liquid bomb or an underwear dynamite, oh well, good for them. Don’t change until they are more successful. How it would apply right now is we assume that passengers will rise up against 4 measely hijackers, so we don’t add extra security. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-real-airline-security-look-like/560903.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-does-real-airline-security-look-like/560903.md?page=4)