chollie

What will happen is TSA will officially announce the authority stop and fondle anyone's body or property anywhere on airport property at any time - just as a few occasionally have done over the years. Their search authority will not be limited to bags and traveling pax, it will include vehicles and non-travelers.

leungy18

Long lines and crowds around security checkpoints create a chokepoint that terrorists can use to maximize casualties.

By moving security to the curb, all TSA is doing would be to move the chokepoint further out.

nigos

TSA has asked me to remove my prescription sunglasses in Boston. It was kind of hilarious given that my normal glasses were busted and without prescription lenses I have a very hard time navigating. I now carry a spare set of frames in order to avoid a repeat performance.

FliesWay2Much

Good point, especially for someone who just had cataract or retina surgery.

I would be tempted, when ordered to remove them, to do my best Mr. Magoo act and knock over one of their standing signs or bump into the side of the pornoscope.

Boggie Dog

File a civil rights complaint with DHS OIG. Requiring a person to remove a medical device is clearly contrary to TSA SOP.

chollie

I have been legally blind since childhood. Clarity of vision starts rapidly disappearing roughly three inches from my face. If you are two feet away, I will have grave difficulty reading your facial expressions, unless you have giant teeth and Grouch Marx eyebrows. For years, my optometrist has said that if I lose my glasses, I should have a white cane for a loaner.

This should come as no surprise. A former vet working as a TSO made another vet take off his prosthetic leg and try to hop over and hold position in the NoS.

gsoltso

Do you have a link for this one? The Vets I mean?

Boggie Dog

Google is your friend.

http://radio.foxnews.com/toddstarnes...ed-marine.html


​​​​​​​

petaluma1

Of course, TSA denies this happened.

http://thehill.com/policy/transporta...rosthetic-legs

and yet 5 months later TSA made changes to screening policy for military amputees:

https://www.dav.org/learn-more/news/...teran-amputee/

chollie

Here's the thing.

We know the traveling wounded vets were real.

TSA told us that the two TSOs who gave the group a bad time were also vets. We have no way of verifying that information, but...a former vet who is a TSO is just as likely to abuse his 'authoritay' as a non-vet TSO, and, like bullies generally, he's much more likely to push helpless people around than he is to pull his cr*p on an able-bodied vet who just might push back.

As is quite common, TSA released that part of the camera footage that it believed would support its version of events. And, as you note, even though TSA claimed nothing was done wrong, somehow TSA also suddenly felt the need to publicly claim the rules had been changed to ensure that something TSA claimed never happened could not happen again.

Unless, of course, the screener felt like exercising his/her discretion to make up the rules again.

Bottom line: I don't know this group of vets, but I find it very hard to understand why a group of vets would all coordinate a pack of lies against two TSOs.

Often1

This, of course, occurs in many countries and specifically at many airports, e.g. pushing the security perimeter further away from the checkpoint and even the building. This includes EU countries such as Belgium, where privacy rights are enshrined in what amounts to its constitution.

The Manchester Grande concert, where the bomber did not pass through security, but waited outside, gives a lot of the security people the willies. Whether you personally approve of TSA and its methods, this is not a TSA issue, but a worldwide one.

There are many things which could be instituted (or even reinstituted from the immediate post-9/11 time) which would be a pain, but not intrusive. Key among these would be having remote passenger drop off for personal vehicles, requiring proof of travel to enter the airport building, and the like.

For all the spluttering on FT, there is a lot of support until it affects the individual.

Boggie Dog

Yes but we know that TSA has no problem lying through its collective teeth.

chollie

Back to the OP, when I try to envision curb-to-gate security, I assume the number one criteria will be to funnel the maximum amount of taxpayers' dollars into the right pockets.

Boggie Dog

In regards to the bolded text. Such as?

As proven in the UK, attacks can take place before security checkpoints with terrible results for large groups of people. Just moving the security point does not improve security. A group wouldn't even need to be at the terminal to attack an entrance area or aircraft parking areas with the availability of remotely piloted vehicles and GPS.

chollie

I think before we seriously consider curb-to-gate security, we should close the security loopholes that already exist.

I think the greatest danger, besides on an aircraft, is in bottle-necked congested areas, particularly because we have yet to see good leadership emerge in the crisis situations we have witnessed. TSOs are trained to protect only themselves, which is particularly problematic for pax, who in times of crisis will naturally gravitate towards the uniforms generally ordering them around. I'm thinking particularly of the awful LAX shooting and the EWR mess over alleged shots. The folks responsible for airport security need to come up with much better emergency plans.