MilesBuzz! - Government rejects delay in bag check deadline

Government rejects delay in bag check deadline

December 19, 2001 Posted: 1:09 PM EST (1809 GMT)

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The government has rejected the airline industry's proposal to extend a deadline to improve baggage screening, transportation officials said Wednesday, adding that the industry also sought to weaken the new guidelines.

The screening and tougher hiring standards for those who conduct it are part of increased security following the September 11 terrorist attacks. The provisions are part of the Aviation and Transportation Security Act enacted November 19.

Department of Transportation officials and representatives from the airline industry met Tuesday to discuss a 60-day deadline to implement screening for all checked bags. That deadline is January 18. The airline industry proposed changing the guidelines so that not every bag would have to be screened, and it also sought to amend a requirement to match bags with passengers.

In rejecting the industry proposal, DOT officials say airlines were told to "step up to the plate" and work to meet the deadline and its requirements, one official said.

http://www.cnn.com/2001/TRAVEL/NEWS/12/19/baggage.screening/index.html

i think that the government, mr mineta [sp], said that the deadline was unrealistic a while ago because of the unavailability of equipment. also, isn't the government going to take over security? who is the government? this sounds like a politician.

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by clacko:

who is the government? this sounds like a politician. </font>


A very profound question. Who indeed IS the government? Some see it as "the be all, end all" answer to everything. Others like the government when it comes to aggressive domestic policy regulations but despise it when it comes to national security.


But one of the biggest problems, and I'm confident many will agree with this, is that the government, as you said, is made of politicians. Call me a skeptic, but no good truly comes from politicians. Hmmm, I guess I'm in an Omni mood! LOL

I am glad that the federal gov't is not allowing the airlines to shirk their responsibilities. They happily took tax payer funded bailout money so I don't want to see them complaining.

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by Analise:
A very profound question. Who indeed IS the government? Some see it as "the be all, end all" answer to everything. Others like the government when it comes to aggressive domestic policy regulations but despise it when it comes to national security.

I am glad that the federal gov't is not allowing the airlines to shirk their responsibilities. They happily took tax payer funded bailout money so I don't want to see them complaining.</font>

Analise, the government is us. After all, isn't it supposed to be of the people, by the people, and for the people? If not, then why are we fighting the Taliban?

Also, I agree with you about the screening, but I think that if the feds are going to require all bags to be screened, they need to have the tools in place to do that, especially since they said they would do so. They do not, so to ask the airlines to meet an impossible deadline is ridiculous.

Well mdTony I was just remarking on what I thought was a profound question. http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/wink.gif And I do see your point about the gov't making unrealistic expectations.

But as for the gov't being of the people, for the people, and by the people as Thomas Jefferson wrote in the Declaration of Independence, I often believe that elected and appointed government officials do not remember that. Often Congress writes laws which don't apply to them (many labor laws fit that category) for example.

I believe Jefferson's ideals have been ignored by far too many people.

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by Analise:
But as for the gov't being of the people, for the people, and by the people as Thomas Jefferson wrote in the Declaration of Independence, I often believe that elected and appointed government officials do not remember that. Often Congress writes laws which don't apply to them (many labor laws fit that category) for example.

I believe Jefferson's ideals have been ignored by far too many people.</font>

They say that absolute power corrupts absolutely. While nobody in Congress or the White House has absolute power, they have a lot of it and it corrupts them a lot.

But in their defense, you've got a lot of different opinions among constituents and you can't keep them all happy. If you institute a program that requires all baggage to be screened, for example, you make the people who travel three or four times a year happy, but you make those of us who sometimes travel that much in a month very unhappy.

Having said that, as Churchill supposedly said, democratic governments are the worst form of government except for every other kind.

okay, i got us ott a bit , but didn't mineta[sp], say that the gear would not be available? ....edit to add isnt he gov't?

[This message has been edited by clacko (edited 12-19-2001).]

what does this have to do w/miles?

If your trip is canceled because the airline doesn't want to bother to meet the bag screening/matching requirement you don't get any miles http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/frown.gif

snake - excellent!

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by clacko:
what does this have to do w/miles?</font>

If you don't like it, don't read it.

As for having something to do with miles, if you have to get to the aiport six hours early because they need that long to screen your bags, it makes earning those miles a huge pain in the ....

mdtony- right on!

Since this thread is meandering a bit already, I'll add one more tangent: How does bag matching work if your bag doesn't make a connection and you do? Surely I'm not the only FT'er who has found that checked baggage does not always heel properly. http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif Will they send it on a later flight as they do now, realizing that it wasn't my fault that the bag didn't make the connection? Or will they have to send me a free ticket to come collect my bag? Oops -- No miles that way. Hmm.

Actually, I'm more interested in them screening the bags for explosives, etc., than I am in the bag matching. What good does bag matching do if terrorists are willing to blow themselves up?

And the last time an explosive device was on a domestic flight?

And do these screeners REALLY catch all devices?

And who is going to pay for them?

And as the manufacturers have indicated, they can not make them fast enough even with the money, so why make the law?

And why is this an issue with an airplane, but not with a train, or bus, or freeway, or any other place with lots of people?

Why are we so stupid and foolish?

But what about the children?? Think of the children!! Baaa

What a country. Congress hurries to pass a law, any law, which contains impossible mandates. Secretary of Transportation waits until after the bill becomes law to tell Congress that they passed a law with requirements that CAN'T BE MET. Congress (and the press) upbraids the hapless Mineta for speaking the truth. King Mineta (no, that's Jester Mineta) quickly changes tune and proclaims that bagmatching WILL occur on time, come hell or high water. Even if implementation kills the patient. What a country.

You guys sound like you may not be buying the "patience is the new form of patriotism" BS anymore than I am. http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/wink.gif

NoStressHere-

So if it's so stupid and foolish, why:

(1) does JetBlue already do it with no problems

-and-

(2) do most international airports do it with no problem.

Also,

(1) haven't planes already been blown up by bombs in the cargo hold?

(2) isn't there the threat of it happening again?

(3) haven't such systems already prevented planes from being blown up?

(4) isn't the preventative cost of implementing a system cheaper than cleaning up after one or two planes get blown up? And I don't just mean the cost of the plane, I mean all of the costs, lost business on the airlines, lost productivity of the passengers (business pax who do business travel tend to account for a LOT of productivity in the economy), cost of putting out fires, providing medical care, etc...

(5) If we're not going to make sure no bombs get into the cargo hold, why don't we entirely stop screening carry-ons? If we can easily get bombs on the plane, terrorists can just get onboard and threaten to blow up the plane if the pilots don't give up control; if they don't, the terrorist blows up the plane. If we don't bother to prevent bombs from getting in the cargo hold, why bother to make sure bombs and guns don't get into the cabin?

d

I would guess this means feeding the bag through a machine before bellying up to the check-in counter...not enough machines could indeed create another choke point at the airport. Having to do hand searches in absence of machines would be diasatrous for that.

Long-term, I just hope they can get better machines and technology and lean harder on that. In other words, upgrade the quality of insspections rather than the quantity.

Most international airports do not examine every checked bag this way, they rely on positive matching to ensure only bags with passengers seated on a given flight travel on that flight. Some are X-rayed, sniffed, etc. but not all. The volumes would make that impossible to achieve. JetBlue can do this because it carries a miniscule number of passengers each day. As does El Al. There are not enough machines, dogs, staff, etc. to handle the volumes of luggage that daily flow through US airports for domestic flights, let alone for international.

Positive baggage matching is the best that can be hoped for on US domestic flights. It is possible, and has been done up here in Canada since October. It has been done on international flights since Lockerby,

Legislators really have to get it through their heads that this is not Hollywood. 100% security, hell 90% security, is impossible to achieve. At the same time, the major threat comes from from misallocated resources, not from any potential terrorists themselves. Suicide bombers, as we have discovered, who take aircraft [and their targets and passengers] with them, are few and far between. Only 4, possibly 5, of those individuals knew of their ultimate fate. The other 15 or more did not.

So the main threat remaining, getting a bomb onboard using checked luggage, can be minimized by at least requiring positive bag/passenger matching. There are unlikely to be many martyrs left out there, who cannot be pre-spotted through other forms of screening, who will be able to get onto a plane. They are more likely to try to check a bag, but no show for their flight.

It is said that Congress, or Parliaments everywhere, can decree a MAN to be a WOMAN, or vice versa. That still does not mean s/he is, but the fiction remains. Legislatures can pass just about anything, so long as it doesn't violate the Constitution or Bill of Rights. They can repeal gravity. For all the good that would do...

It would only take 6-12 suicide terrorists to blow themeselves and the planes they were on in one day and the entire US aviation industry would shut down for a very very long time.

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by Tango:
It would only take 6-12 suicide terrorists to blow themeselves and the planes they were on in one day and the entire US aviation industry would shut down for a very very long time.</font>

Though I am not convinced this could/would happen, lets assume it might. If so, then out checking of bags and people should be more directed to uncovering this potential. This would NOT include:
* checking IDs over and over
* digging through underwear looking for nailclippers, corkscrews, etc
* shutting down the first 100-200 ft or so of parking garages and rental car areas
* spending unknows amounts of money on National Guard to stand around
* Not allowing knifes on inflight meals, or the airport shops
* Feeling up woman because they bra straps set off the alarms
etc. etc.

Tango and NoStressHere (perhaps not most honest handle judging from the post) I agree with you both.

We have to check luggage for explosives. Currently passenger planes carry cargo and that should be checked also. It's a big job. The government should STAY OUT OF IT except to legislate a realistic timeframe and then let private enterprise work it out.

The deadline was never realistic. JetBlue may do it, but they have nowhere near the traffic of AA, UA, DL, etc.

But it must be done and it must be done very soon. If necessary, they will have to do manual searches. This could be implemented fairly quickly by hiring a lot of temporary people. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to paw through people's bags. We might have complaints about that but it will have to be done if that is what it takes.

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by richard:
Tango and NoStressHere (perhaps not most honest handle judging from the post) I agree with you both. ...</font>

You got me there. I usually do not stress over much of anything, delays, cancelled flights, etc. But, have to admit, the foolishness of our fears and "things we do" all for the sake of safety have gotten to me. I was really stressed for awhile, but have let it go.. sort of. Still bothers me that we spend multi millions, maybe billions for very little increased security, just extra hassle and more lost jobs.

Why can't we as a country learn from other countries? I have never seen LHR allowing anyone other than passengers to the gates even before Sept 11 or in Amsterdam or in Bombay. Why do we have to be 'different' all the time even in cases which does not make any sense? There are some things that we haven't got quite right.

We don't have a standard voting/balloting system (learn from India).
We don't have standard security procedures in airports (learn from India, UK).
We have 3-4 different inferior cellphone systems and the entire Europe, Asia and Africa has a standardized system(GSM) (Learn from them).

Westcoaster,

Twice, we've made the international connection, but our luggage didn't. It did show up the following day in each case. I asked about bag matching, and was told the bag was x-rayed prior to being loaded on the plane, and a notation was made so that it could fly without us.

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by ClubChamp:
Westcoaster,

Twice, we've made the international connection, but our luggage didn't. It did show up the following day in each case. I asked about bag matching, and was told the bag was x-rayed prior to being loaded on the plane, and a notation was made so that it could fly without us.</font>

Thanks, ClubChamp. Sounds like a reasonable solution.