Certain policies are fundamentally ridiculous where the small potential benefit is greatly outweighed by the loss of individual rights and the inconvenience.

One individual managed to put a chemical compound in his shoe. Now, all shoes must be scanned by a machine to look for chemicals. A perfect example of a response that is far greater than the threat.

You have a boarding pass. You show the boarding pass to the agent at the head of the que. You then show it, again, to another agent at the X-ray machine. Why? All of it wastes time and provides very little additional security.

The only thing I can be sure of is the fact that the TSA will overreact to any possible perceived threat, independent of the size of the threat.

Some people are OK with all of it............so they can be "SAFE".

You cannot make it clear to him.

The reason is that he believes the statement that the individual is a retired military veteran.

If the man is a retired military veteran (and this is by no means a certainty), he might warrant reduced screening.

However, there is no possibility for the TSA to determine if this individual is truly a retired military service person or is a terrorist dressing in similar garb.

Husky doesn't realize this fact and he will continue to argue in favor of reduced screening for the military because of it.

I don't think the veteran in question wanted a free pass throough security. It was the crude way that TSA and the other security folk treated him because of his handicap....

The TSA was simply doing the usual TSA job...............no more and no less. They didn't give him a pass because he was supposedly "military".

If you can support the "crude way the TSA treated him" please do so.

The article doesn't support your premise.

All it took was a few minutes of research on his part to get preferential treatment which is what I keep saying.

for one, everyone has to remove their jackets and go though a metal detector or scanner. Injured servicemen can actually be excused some of these requirements if they give advance notice.

"Concurrent with that incident, TSA announced it had changed its rules to eliminate a requirement that injured troops remove their shoes, jackets or hats. But to receive the expedited service, TSA asks affected personnel to call the agency’s Military Severely Injured Joint Service Operations Center before traveling.
TSA also offers escorted “curb-to-gate service” for injured or ill personnel who request it as well as the TSA Pre program to service members with a military common access card at four airports: Charlotte Douglas International Airport in North Carolina, Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport, Seattle-Tacoma International Airport, and Washington Dulles International Airport."

this whole thing is overblown hype. as the article states-

"At the airport, bystanders stared as the TSA security screener looked under Kemnitz’s medals, ran his hands under the Marine’s waistband and swabbed his shoes for explosives.
“What does a uniform and heroism represent if our own citizens — in this case employees of the TSA and security personnel — have no regard for them?” wrote Kemnitz’s escort, Patricia Martin, to Veterans Affairs Secretary Eric Shinseki following the incidents."


What I gather is he took no advantage of any of the preferential treatment rules under the TSA for veterans and especially wounded veterans, going through the standard security screening, and subsequently having to be searched because the TSA must check him and because of his injury preventing the usual scanner use.

While I appreciate his predicament, what assurance does any security officer have that he was actually injured? for all they know he could not raise his arm because of the C4 jammed in his armpit in his rented marine uniform.

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I agree on a lot of this, but personally ive found things to getting more streamlined since TSA was first started. TSA was terrible early on, but IMO its been improving, even with stupid rules like 25 checks of your boarding pass.

Scanning baggage and walking through metal detectors has been an airport norm since the 70s, at least since southern airways flight 49 and the nuclear reactor threat.
All TSA has done has taken a thousand slightly different screening processes run by independent contractors and made it federal and standardized. I don't have too much problem with that, and lately I haven't found it much different than pre 9/11 security apart from improved technology and having to remove my shoes.

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The TSA will definitely appreciate your defense of their policies and procedures. They expect to continue them and probably escalate them because of folks like you.

Apparently, you forgot about the fact that you can't bring your toothpaste...........you can't bring a bottle of liquor.............you can't bring your shampoo............

Apparently, your don't realize that the full body scanner takes significantly more time than the x-ray machine.

Apparently, you don't understand that the full body scanner demands that EVERYTHING be removed from EVERY pocket............a ridiculous PITA.

And you certainly don't understand that the entire shoe affair really sucks up the minutes.

The whole process is so slow that I don't believe they can process more than 120 people per hour at a single station. Patently ridiculous IMHO.

Really sucks up the minutes if you are not prepared for the requirements, sure.

The last 4 flights ive been on I breezed through security in under 20 minutes, and from major airports. Yes taking off shoes and not bringing specific items is annoying, but only if you are surprised by it, which no one should be at this point.

As far as the time of the scanner, you walk in, it rotates, you walk out. Takes longer than walking under a regular detector, but still we are talking about 5 seconds of time, unless you have a bunch of change or crap that sets it off. You are waiting in line, put all the stuff in your carry on bag.

Secondly you can bring all those other items provided you bring them in the reduced sizes allowable. Even liquor. Lots of delay happens because of people who arrive at security after waiting in line and are surprised at the clearly posted rules appear to concern them also.

I find it mildly irritating, not an earth shattering imposition. I find it more irritating that its such a shock to people that they have to take off their shoes and delay the line. I don't fly that much, maybe once or twice a year on average, but even I remember that.

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Your ongoing defense of their policies and procedures is the primary reason why we are in the current state of affairs.

Folks like you willingly accept a massive reduction in convenience for minimal safety and attempt to justify that massive inconvenience by relating one single anecdotal story of how they "breezed through security".

Apparently, you never flew out of Atlanta in the late afternoon.

No I haven't flown out of Atlanta recently, though that would qualify as one single anecdotal story, wouldn't it?

I said the last 4 times Ive flew, which has been logan, NYC, and SFO, and the security checks were not a big deal in 3 different airports flying at heavy volume times, nor at chicago or dallas (though those were connecting flights without going through security), apart from one time in logan where I had to go through security after getting off a plane and trying to make another.

also, I think you are equating my statements that the security processes are manageable and getting faster with a statement that I believe them to be entirely necessary.

Thats not the case, I see a purpose for the scanner and baggage xray, but less so for repeated checks of boarding pass, fluid restrictions, shoes, and so on. Then again im not an explosives expert, so im not sure the forms and volume an explosive needs to be to do damage.
Seems to me it should be all or none. I don't see how a small toothpaste tube full of C4 glued to a plane window is any less dangerous than a large one in the same place, so the size restriction is I think silly. They should allow everything or nothing in that case.

The amount of firearms they strip off people I think demonstrates the utility of running people through detectors and their luggage, which outside of terrorism fears, does at least make me pleased that idiots who forget where their gun is or say they "forgot" where their gun is brought it in their carry on luggage. Easy enough to place it under the plane.

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Then we agree that their procedures are a bit over the top and the time and expense necessary to implement every procedure 100% of the time isn't worth it.

I find it interesting that the TSA will do everything in their power short of stripping the public naked to prevent any damage to the aircraft. However, it's common knowledge that any terrorist with a small shoulder fired missile can take out any departing aircraft with relative ease at just about any large airport in the country.

The government hasn't addressed this possibility at all because they are too busy reacting to some DB who put some chemicals in his shoe.

That's the fundamental problem with the TSA..........run amok preventing a possibility that has a 1:100000000 chance of occurring.

So true. We used to train to do this at Bragg. So very effective. A few seconds and you're gone. A team of 5 single man Grail or Stinger fireers would completely shut down a major airport and be gone before the cops could get them. Hit probability would be 4 of 5. Massive heat signature on a commercial plane at takeoff

Now you have gone and done it. Your expose' will make the traveling public more nervous and paranoid than it already is.

you are right... truly, though, the thought crosses my mind sometimes when I fly and we are taking off...

I went through the whole procedure of how we practiced to do it (not posting that in public, but it's not rocket science) to a colleague in the days following 9/11 and it was years before he flew again..

BTW, Grails are out there...not just in the ME eiither....think places like where the Boston bombers were from...

I go for the opt-out search, then smile, wink, and ask "did you enjoy that, because I sure did."

Never fails to make the TSA guy look uncomfortable, and I'm content that I've added a bit more stress to his daily life.