I don’t know if I’ve ever seen armed soldiers doing security detail at a US airport. I fly several times a year, and I really don’t pay attention to that stuff; if I do notice it at the time, I forget about it later.
I saw an armed soldier at the TSA checkpoint December 21, 2009 in the Honolulu, Hawaii airport. He was standing in front of the escalators that went up to the gate area. He was definitely keeping an eye on the whole area.
I don’t know if he was a soldier, but a guy in uniform with a submachine gun was patrolling Penn Station in NY on the morning of Jan. 5. There were guards examining luggage too. I avoided all the hassle by getting a redcap and went down to the platform by direct elevator.
I’ve had soldiers in full uniform with sidearms inspect my car in St. Louis.
I also had the odd distinction of being in Washington Reagan National on the first anniversary of 9/11 and the airport was being guarded by every conceivable civilian and military organization in the greater DC area.
Right after 9/11. When I was in Mexico City last March, there were heavily armed federal police nearly everywhere in the airports and the city center, toting Uzis, shotguns, etc.
Because police are everywhere. What they do in airports isn’t any different than what they do patrolling the streets. Seeing soldiers in an airport would be an extreme measure of security. Seeing a police officer wouldn’t be.
And I’m trying to bust the idea that in airports, there are extreme measures of security that people should be afraid of.
I saw a whole…I don’t know the proper term, but a bunch of National Guard people, with guns and dogs, at SFO in October 2001. It was startling and scary. I usually fly two-three times a year or so.
I’ve seen far more armed people in public places in Europe than in the US, actually. (Which makes it amusing when I see Europeans talking about how Americans love guns. The above instance is the only time I have EVER seen weapons in a public place in the US, police officers’ holstered weapons excepted. But no one seems to bat an eye when hordes of military people wander around the Paris Metro with rifles.)
I suspect most dopers will have an answer that is 2001, plus a few years maybe.
Dinsdale said “police in riot gear” (ie armed with heavy weapons, helmets, body armour and black SWAT type uniforms). If you see those guys “everywhere” on your streets, I’d like to know where you live.
I don’t think they are at all different from the Army or Nat’l Guard. Their presence implies an unusual and immediate danger; their presence is intentionally intimidating.
Aside from the Guardsmen & NYPD K9s I see daily in Penn Station, I have most recently seen armed soldiers patrolling in an airport last October.
What he said.
It really surprises me that you wouldn’t see the distinction. That you failed to makes me question the sincerity of your remarks.