Originally Posted by
LHR/MEL/Europe FF
No one is disputing that. But like the story above of the person in the car accident worried about their wheel rim... I have a similar story of a friend in a car accident... a passenger thrown from the car was asking for the sandwich they had been consuming at the time of the accident.
While there may be some people who know what they're doing is wrong (stopping to collect a bag), there might be others who are in shock and not making a rational decision.
There could potentially be two prongs of attack here: education to dissuade those who 'know' what they're doing, and measures to ensure that in 2015 and beyond, evacuation standards can still be met given at least some people may be in shock and not 'know' what they're doing and take bags.
As for proposals about fining passengers and bringing criminal charges - it's rare for this to happen in aviation (with exceptions in some countries). It seems counter intuitive that a pilot might be responsible for crashing the plane and face no criminal consequence, but a passenger in shock taking a bag in the subsequent evacuation is charged or fined.
Not to go too OT, but the problem is that for some reason, English-speaking countries have developed a culture that requires blame anytime something goes wrong. Sometimes bad things happen, but I'm personally very much against the idea of ever criminalizing a matter where malice or intent cannot be proven.