Identifying Airline Security Threats (Updated)
[Guest post by DRJ]
In the wake of the terrorist attack on Northwest Flight #253, the TSA has issued new rules:
“Some airlines were telling passengers on Saturday that new government security regulations prohibit them from leaving their seats beginning an hour before landing. The regulations are a response to a suspected terrorism incident on Christmas Day.”
Other reports indicate passengers will not be allowed access to carry-on bags and will be prohibited from putting blankets or pillows on their laps during the last hour of a flight.
Meanwhile, the father of the Nigerian suspect says he warned the U.S. Embassy about his son in November:
“A congressional official said Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, a 23-year-old Nigerian, popped up in U.S. intelligence reports about four weeks ago as having a connection to both al-Qaida and Yemen.
Another government official said Abdulmutallab’s father went to the embassy in Abuja with his concerns, but did not have any specific information that would put him on the “no-fly list” or on the list for additional security checks at the airport.
Neither was the information sufficient to revoke his visa to visit the United States. His visa had been granted June 2008 and was valid through June 2010. Both officials spoke on condition of anonymity because neither was authorized to speak to the media.”
Our government clearly learned nothing from 9/11. Instead, we ended up with a system that ignores a man identified as a threat by a family member, but adopts a rule that treats everyone else as a threat.
RELATED: This AP article has similar information and reports on the filing of charges against the suspect, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab.
— DRJ
UPDATE: CNN has a still shot of the suspect taken onboard the plane.
Great. A number of heavily travelled routes, e.g. Los Angeles to San Francisco are less than an hour; so if you can’t get up to leave your seat in the last hour before landing–well you can just dang well get in your seat, shutup and sit still if you want to fly from LA to San Francisco. What mental giant GS-12 writes these rules?
Mike Myers (3c9845) — 12/26/2009 @ 4:11 pmThe TSA is gay I think. Except for the lady at JFK what found my button.
For reals. Me and NG had gone through their little gate thingy and we went and got breakfast and I was sitting there and noticed my button was gone off my coat.
I went back and said hey did you guys find a button… they had everyone looking on every lane and no button. So I go back to the food court and sit down and this TSA lady runs up to me… with guess what? My button!!
That was a huge Win. Those JFK TSA ones were awesome I think… it just may be their bosses what are gay gay gay.
happyfeet (2c63dd) — 12/26/2009 @ 4:21 pmWhat kind of stupid kabuki-theatre move is this? Can’t get up an hour before landing? So you detonate 1:30 before landing. Big change in the outcome, eh?
Here’s a new rule that would work. You are strapped naked to an upright backboard/bench, and shackled in for the duration of the flight. At least you get off the plane safe, right?
Anything less than that won’t work, because people will find a loophole to exploit.
Until we actually start looking at people, and behavior as the Israelis do, we’re never going to get any safer than we are now. Not racial profiling, Individual profiling.
NavyspyII (df615d) — 12/26/2009 @ 4:35 pmI don’t get what’s so magical about the last hour really. Those kwafty tewwowists might could think outside of the last hour box, no? I bet they could. I bet some luckless little flunky at the gay gay gay TSA is writing a career-ending memo suggesting such a possibility as we speak.
happyfeet (2c63dd) — 12/26/2009 @ 4:36 pmThings like this just go to show that recruiting actual suicide attackers from inside the US is not that easy. Otherwise we’d have a bunch of blown up security queues rather than two failed attempts with PETN. Making people too afraid to stand in the screening line would do just as much and possibly more to disrupt travel than a successful airliner attack.
Soronel Haetir (2b4c2b) — 12/26/2009 @ 4:49 pmThere are so many interesting things that smart, populist politicians could campaign on to fix. Candidates could really capture the public’s attention and support in 2010 by proposing some logical changes to our security screening and airport processes. You know, things that don’t so obviously treat regular people as threats solely in the name of political correctness—and focusing more on people in specific age/ethnic groups and those with known terrorist ties, monitoring US visas, and keeping better track of those travelers already on watch lists, etc.
No system will ever be perfect, but as others have already mentioned, air travel and the airline industry is going to die for lack of willing “customers” if this disrespect keeps getting worse and airport and travel experiences get more onerous.
elissa (ffa8b1) — 12/26/2009 @ 4:50 pmhappyfeet,
I’m glad they found your button but I hope TSA workers work on having the skills of police officers instead of workers at a dry cleaners. Both are jobs we need in society but the former’s skills seem to fit better with the TSA’s job responsibilities than the latter’s.
DRJ (84a0c3) — 12/26/2009 @ 4:50 pmWell, this will do wonders for air travel…
I expect the numbers of travellers to just explode (Heh).
Just don’t know what we would do without the efforts our our valiant TSA drones.
AD - RtR/OS! (3ace85) — 12/26/2009 @ 4:54 pmDRJ, we’re not going to get a better quality of screener as long as they’re paid roughly the same wages as “do you want fries with that?” I’m not suggesting that increased pay solely will make them more capable, but the standards they have to pass seem awfully minimal.
Dmac (a964d5) — 12/26/2009 @ 4:58 pmI think it varies in different parts of the country, Dmac, but that’s a good point.
Also, I’ve updated the post with a Breitbart/CNN link that purports to be a photo of the suspect.
DRJ (84a0c3) — 12/26/2009 @ 5:02 pmThere are so many interesting things that smart, populist politicians could campaign on to fix. Candidates could really capture the public’s attention and support in 2010 by proposing some logical changes to our security screening and airport processes. You know, things that don’t so obviously treat regular people as threats solely in the name of political correctness—and focusing more on people in specific age/ethnic groups and those with known terrorist ties, monitoring US visas, and keeping better track of those travelers already on watch lists, etc.
No system will ever be perfect, but as others have already mentioned, air travel and the airline industry is going to die for lack of willing “customers” if this disrespect keeps getting worse and airport and travel experiences get even more tedious and onerous. I am so glad we were able to do a lot of vacation and business travel before 9/11.
elissa (ffa8b1) — 12/26/2009 @ 5:03 pmelissa, that would be true if we had smart, populist politicians with anything resembling a back-bone.
AD - RtR/OS! (3ace85) — 12/26/2009 @ 5:07 pmWhat we have are just a bunch of craven hacks.
TSA was made up of bottom dwellers prior to 9/11, afterward they all got big fat raises and became Federal Employees! Same people, now making a whole bunch more $ and still doing the same lack luster job. Most of these folks would not qualify for that “would you like fries with that” job. They would have to like work and communicate with others!
***********
Hey kid, yer daddy thinks you are full of shit, you bets book passage on a boat, cuz we aint gonna haul you.
***********
Everybody on that plane was very lucky the device failed! That is the only reason they are here today because the device failed. You can bet those making such things will get better.
Desire the airlines to take measures to protect you, quit flying till they figure out you will not buy tickets if certain folks are also on the plane. Make the problem the airlines, they will figure something out.
TC (0b9ca4) — 12/26/2009 @ 5:29 pmThe thing that the TSA and our gov’t will never admit is that profiling works – the Israelis at El Al airlines have proven that over the past few decades. No terrorist attacks on any of their flights, which is why that nutjob went after their ticket agents in LAX a few years ago. They’ve always taken the utmost seriousness regarding air travel, and their pilots are skilled in taking evasive maneuvers in case of an attempted hijack, since there are usally MOSSAD members on each flight as well.
Dmac (a964d5) — 12/26/2009 @ 5:32 pmThese rules are ridiculous.
Once upon a time we had nothing to fear but fear itself. Now, we’re happy to let fear rule us.
If the goal of terrorists is to make us so afraid that we sabotage ourselves out of our fear, they’re winning.
aphrael (07144e) — 12/26/2009 @ 6:02 pmHe had it in his briefs. So what is next, no briefs?
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OBAMA = PC laxity.
Kevin Stafford (abdb87) — 12/26/2009 @ 8:04 pmOnly PROFILING = security.
Kevin Stafford (abdb87) — 12/26/2009 @ 8:04 pmAre they going to issue Depends with the airsickness bags, or sell them?
htom (412a17) — 12/26/2009 @ 8:22 pmThe Wages Of Diversity: Full Body Scans, Forever
Apparently there were no security devices in place to detect the kind of explosive that Abdul Mutallab brought on board the Northwest flight, sewn into his underpants.
[Richard] Clarke said full body scans were needed, “but they’re expensive and they’re intrusive. They invade people’s privacy.”
It may be intrusive, humiliating, violative of our privacy, and damned expensive, but if it’s the only way to prevent terrorist explosions on airliners, then that’s where it’s heading. A full body scan every time you fly anywhere in the Western world, with ticket prices (or taxes) going up considerably to cover the cost of these expensive procedures.
And all because, all because …
… all because we have Muslims in the West. The facts are that a significant portion of Muslims are sharia supporters, and that a significant portion of sharia supporters are potential or active jihadists, and that it’s not possible for us to disentangle the “non-dangerous” Muslims from the dangerous ones, because they are all part of one Islamic community, bound by sacred ties and obligated to defend each other from the infidel. Therefore, as long as a significant number of Muslims remain in the West, and are free to travel in the West, the threat and reality of Islamic domestic terrorism will remain, and we will have to live under these onerous security regimes, undergoing a full body scan every time we take a flight, FOREVER.
It doesn’t have to be this way. We’re not trapped. We have a choice. Sixty years ago, there were no Muslims in the West. All we have to do, then, is … TURN BACK THE CLOCK.
Impossible, you say? It’s not impossible. We just stop letting Muslims into the West, and we tell the ones who are already here that they’re not welcome. And if they don’t leave voluntarily, through a combination of carrots and sticks, then we make them leave. Not because we hate them as individuals, but because, given that their religion commands them to subvert, subjugate, and kill us, the ONLY way that we can be safe and free is if they’re not here.
The liberals and “conservatives” will shriek that to exclude Muslims will make us racist and evil, it will make us “as immoral as the terrorists,” as the editor of a conservative magazine once said to me.
Not so. To quote Bob Dylan:
You will not die
Horatio (55069c) — 12/27/2009 @ 6:48 amIt’s not poison.
Napolitano was on This Week and gave the most ridiculous performance I think I’ve seen a politician give on a TV show, and that is saying something. She said that everything worked as planned and, as soon as the terrorist disclosed his presence, the passengers leaped into action and they are now studying the situation.
The passengers !!!! ????
So the passengers are now the front line of the TSA !
Where do I collect my TSA salary ?
It was even worse than Madeline Halfbright saying that the Clinton administration took terrorism seriously. Why, she said they were holding meetings every week about it !
This was even worse.
Mike K (2cf494) — 12/27/2009 @ 9:16 amAll this blather from TSA and the DHS about how we need to be taking all these measures like the security theater at the airport, Real-ID, and other such affronts is crazy.
They tell us it is so that the terrorists do not win.
The terrorists HAVE won, and it is being won with our own government employees. All these people work for the terrorists because the idea is to destroy freedom. That freedom has indeed BEEN destroyed. We are now slaves to the whims of GS-whatevers in DC.
I am not one of those folks who sees black helicopters and the ZOG and all the rest of that sort of thing. But there incidents like one onthe Amsterdam/Detroit flight that have “Reichstag fire” written all over them,
the friendly grizzly (619aeb) — 12/27/2009 @ 9:44 amWhat a telling fact that our government has to rely on private citizens to do the government’s job. Maybe this means we should disburse Napolitano’s salary to the heroic passengers. This way, our taxpayer money will go to people who actually deserve it.
Alan (07ccb5) — 12/27/2009 @ 9:50 amUh, remember the crazy, fanatic doctor who killed several people at Fort Hood not long ago? The doctor who spouted off Islamofascist rhetoric at the drop of a hat and apparently due to political correctness run amok (in the military, no less!) did not get anyone in the army to lift a finger to sound the alarm bell?
If such utter idiocy is found there, expect tons more of it elsewhere. Expect ass-backwardness galore, in which, for instance, old white-haired women — in the name of socio-political fairness and cultural-deconstructionist do-gooderness — will be inconvenienced as much, if not more, than, say, a dark-complexioned, foreign-based guy who attempts to bring down a jet plane.
Mark (411533) — 12/27/2009 @ 10:20 amUh, remember the crazy, fanatic doctor who killed several people at Fort Hood not long ago?
I want Napolitano to say that the system worked in that case as well. And I want every American to hear it.
Alan (07ccb5) — 12/27/2009 @ 10:22 amOf course the one hour rule is important: it’s much safer to have an airliner catch fire or blow up at 30,000 feet than when it’s coming in for a landing. I’m just surprised that no one here realized that.
The Dana who sees the value here (474dfc) — 12/27/2009 @ 2:36 pmThe simple fact is that non-citizens do not have any right to enter the United States. Once Mr Abdulmutallab’s name appeared on a concern list, it should have been cross-referenced with no-fly lists, no-entry lists and existing visa applications. Fox News has a screen crawl which said that Mr Abdulmutallab had a multi-entry visa, meaning that he could come and go as he pleased, and that he had traveled widely in Europe and might have been in Yemen. The visa was issued last year, so we can’t blame the Obama Administration for that, but once we were warned about him, we should have done some cross-checking.
The Dana with a touch of common sense (474dfc) — 12/27/2009 @ 2:40 pmTime to adopt Israeli-style profiling – we cannot spend equal energy checking EVERYONE boarding a plane – focus on the possible problem areas. When was the last time a MacDonald or Smith tried to blow up a plane in the name of Allah or Mohammad ?
Focus on the Abduls, Mohammud, Iqbals, etc and get the flying public safe. You need to go uck-hunting where the ducks are – not in a field of mixed birds.
Or go one better – like a previous poster said – turn back the clock 60 years and kick out all the Muslims from North America.
Although the USA has the nuclear capability to basically eliminate this threat – they do not use it, since there would be collateral damage. However – can you imagine if ANY of the radical Muslim nations had access to this nuclear caability ? They would NUKE Washington or New York in the name of Allah as fast as you could blink…….perhaps some pre-emptive strikes need to be brought back to the table.
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