Airport Screenings

[jiacinto]

I travelled out of the area this weekend. Anyway, at both airports, I was forced to go through security and take off my shoes. I got the "royal" treatment at the gate.

Has that ever happened to you?

[DemoTex]

1. The TSA published guidelines that cancelled shoe removal requirements

I'm not sure of the effective date of the new policy. Now TSA agents will "urge" passengers to "voluntarily" remove their shoes. Were you "urged"? Did you "volunteer"?

[jiacinto]

3. No

I got my boarding pass and went to the gate. I was told to go to the "far left" and that "someone would take care of me". It seemed like everyone else was passing. I felt very intimidated by it all.

I then had to take off my shoes. Then the screener used his magnetic dectector to check my belt and my pockets.

Then I went to the gate. This happened when I was leaving both airports.

[DemoTex]

19. Again, not sure when new policy kicks in.

But the days of getting your sock feet wet in snow-melt are apparently over.

[MattNC]

2. yep

it's ridiculous.

i don't take any carry-on's now just so they dont have to go apeshit looking through everything and holding people up.

[DoctorBombay]

4. I've had very good luck

Never had to. And my home airport is LAX. *knocks on wood*

Actually, the last couple times I've flown, they seem to be pulling far fewer people out of line. I rarely, if ever, see the checks before boarding, either. It's really watered down since last year, from what I can tell.

[Kathy in Cambridge]

5. Yes, frequently

this fake screening is a waste of the taxpayers' money. It is window dressing to make people feel safer.

I have been flying at least once a month since 9-11, and I feel no safer now than I did then, especially since the majority of folks being screened are the elderly and businesspeople. I don't condone racial profiling in any way, but they have to develop more sophisticated methods of targeting possible terrorists. They will not be able to prevent a future terrorist attack given their current methods.

On edit: my home airport is Logan, but the worst delays I have experienced are at Buffalo airport.

[jiacinto]

7. It has to be random

If it isn't random then it's statistically flawed.

[TahitiNut]

18. Wrong.

"Random" is not the only way to obtain statistically valid coverage, and is very rarely the best way. For airport screening, as in other kinds of sampling, stratified sampling techniques are appropriate. The chances that a 70-year-old woman would be (even inadvertently) involved in a terrorist plot are quite a bit less, even if not impossible. Thus, "low profile" folks such as her could be 'sampled' at half the frequency without compromising either civil liberties or security. Likewise, males between the ages of maybe 15 and 45 might get a little extra 'sampling'. I'm not in favor of racial profiling at all, nor am I in favor of any 'free passes' whatsoever, including flight crews. Varying sampling, however, is just good cost-effectiveness (emphasis on the 'effectiveness').

That said, I also agree that the inanely visible and noxious 'security' measures in place in most airports is just so much kabuki. Window dressing. It's marketing. Given the near-absence of such 'security' at many smaller airports all over this country and others, and the ludicrous perimeter security at most airports, I see very little in the way of actual impediments confronting determined terrorists.

FWIW, the last time I flew several weeks ago, I not only had my shoes screened, but my checked baggage was searched. (They leave "love notes".) As a 60-year-old paunchy male, I was just a bit bemused.

[MattNC]

12. agreed

I don't know if this falls under the official 'racial profiling' definition or not, but when my aunt and I were coming into NYC during a recent holiday (with the alert level at 'orange') and traffic checks were occurring, I noticed the van in front of us was being inspected a lot more thoroughly than our SUV. The occupants of the van were of Arab descent. I have to admit I felt the actions taken by the officials were okay. That opinion may put me in the minority here though.

[Kathy in Cambridge]

14. Well, I kind of agree with you

that if the average terrorist is a male of Middle Eastern descent between 25 and 35, then it makes sense to randomly check these individuals. I thought I'd never advocate this, but I have seen too many grandpas with walkers and mothers traveling alone with two babies get the full search. I have qualms with the way the screeners and our government would handle searching passengers based on ethnic maleup. There is no easy answer here.

[lkinsale]

16. searching kids and elderly

There was a thread on DU not long ago linked to an article about a teddy bear with a loaded gun in it that was discovered on x-ray. Someone in FL had given the bear to a kid on vacation in FL.

It would be incredibly easy to say, "Hsst, kid, you want this Gameboy? Don't tell your parents!" And how many kids would take it and not tell?

Search the kids too. They desperately need to be protected from their own innocence.

Same with the elderly, or harried mother--or anyone, for that matter--who might leave their purse or bag unattended for a few moments while in the bathroom.

And consider that the random searching itself is a deterrant. I don't think they'll try planes next time. They'll do something easier.

[kayell]

6. They hate my Birkenstocks

Have always made me slip them off and examined them VERY carefully. I ask you, what can you hide in a birkenstock? Damn socialist, hippie, european footware I guess. My feet are too spoiled to change now though.

[TahitiNut]

20. Mine too.

I suppose they could imagine the soles filled with plastique, but such selective paranoia would be truly unbalanced.

[sfecap]

8. Hell yes...and I'm a pilot!

They get my shoes everytime. It's the metal in the soles. Of course, I'm a crewmember. But my toes are safe. :-)

[Catshrink]

9. I learned not to wear Timberland boots

when walking through the detector. Anything shoe with steel in it will set the sucker off.

They told me next time to take them off before the detector and send the shoes through on the conveyor belt. Never wore them again on board.

[Against ME]

10. No, but I am "white"

Both time's I've been to the airport in the last few months, they only checked arab men in their late 20s to early 40s.

Hence the problem with searching, it's obviouly skewed towards arabs, and it obviously acheives nothing.

[jiacinto]

11. I'm not an Arab

And I was stopped. I was told that it was because I bought my ticket at the last minute.

[Against ME]

13. Isn't it supposed to be "random"

So now they're selecting the people based on the time when they purchase their ticket?

[Kathy in Cambridge]

15. Last minute purchases and one ways or multiple legs

flag you for a search. All of the above travel behaviors describe the typical business traveler.

I get searched all the time, probably based on some of these travel behaviors. (BTW I'm blonde with blue eyes).

[lkinsale]

17. My husband is always searched

He's blond and blue-eyed too. ;) But he has artificial hips which always set off the alarm.

I've been searched when I forgot to take my keys out of my pocket. Also just randomly selected.

I really don't consider it an insult. The more you fly, the more it will happen to you.

[Set]

23. the less you fly, the less it will happen to you.

if they choose to treat me like a criminal, f*ck'em. I'll drive or take the bus.

I formulated this position after having my shoes searched THREE TIMES at THREE DIFFERENT LOCATIONS to board ONE flight. And I wasn't even carrying a gun in my checked baggage that time.

[mitchum]

21. Last year I was flying all over the Eastern seaboard...

a couple of times a week and EVERY time the whole routine (pulled out line, shoe removal, etc...) Apparently this was due to my use of one way E-tickets. And I thought it was my lean and hungry look...

[davsand]

22. I was told that any online ticket purchase will "flag" you.

It was off the record, but I was told that by a very harried lady at American Airlines. This was after I'd flown from Indianapolis to Ft. Myers, Fl. We got searched at every freaking gate. My husband, my kid and me.

When we checked in into the airport, the lady put a red X on our tickets. I got into Florida and I actually asked about it. The lady was polite enough about it, but I could tell she was mighty nervous talking about it. She suggested that next time we book thru a travel agent so there would be less concern--there'd be more of a "trail."

Since then, my husband has flown for business a few times, and each time we've booked online, and each time he gets searched. He's a white guy who is bald with a mustache--not exactly a huge threat and not exactly fitting any profile. The only thing about him that would make anybody nervous is that he works for a social justice agency (read as he's a liberal!) and he's a labor union member who buys tickets online.

I'd not take it personally, Jiacinto...

Laura

[ProdigalJunkMail]

24. i fly a lot...

but thankfully have not been able to attribute the 'random' searches to anything in particular. I book online and through an agent (depending on needs and who is picking up the tab) and that has made no difference in my case. What I cannot understand is how I set off the damned magnetometers every time. When I fly I make a concerted effort to have ZERO metal on my body. Tennis shoes...athletic shorts...t-shirt. I even take off my wedding ring and remove ALL items from my pockets. I still set the damned things off. Get wanded and not even a beep...any physicists out there that can give me a clue???

Thanks...
TheProdigal (in dire need of a clue most of the time)

[FlaGranny]

26. I can't give you a clue, but

the same thing happens to my husband. He always sets those danged things off. He practically has to get naked. He used to carry his prescription pills in his pocket and someone once said it could be them. Not sure, though, and we haven't flown for quite some time.

[Mari333]

25. Yep and Im an old lady

my husband and I are both grey headed, and we always have to take off our shoes. We wont fly anymore, we will drive or take the bus...the hell with the TSA and their blacklists..we are boycotting the airlines.

[sweetheart]

27. How it SHOULD work

Every time they check you and me, they're wasting resources and missing the bad guy. I really believe they should issue each traveller with an "air traveller identity pass" that allows them to swipe you at the entry and discover you've travelled 40 times by air since sept 11th, and 2594 times before... its time we let the innocent be innocent.

Myself in a fitness craze a year or two back was stopped for looking too much like a special ops potential... but i notice a distinct relation between the total dollar value of my clothing and my likelihood of being stoopped... if i'm over 2000$ with full business gear on, i'm never stopped. Even airport security is a plutocracy.

Count your blessings, if the israeli's were running airport security, they'd just execute children and dodgey lookers. http://www.guardian.co.uk/g2/story/0,3604,1007051,00.html