FlyerTalk Forums - View Single Post - Electronic devices ban Europe to the US [merged threads]
Old May 30, 2017, 10:26 am
  #1085  
MSY-MSP
 
Join Date: Dec 2002
Location: Rochester, MN
Programs: UA GS, AA PLT, HH Diamond
Posts: 1,437
Originally Posted by RadioGirl
You keep suggesting this 1+1 solution but I don't see how it addresses the risk. If a laptop is dangerous, it's dangerous. The only thing this would do is (theoretically) reduce the number of devices to be swabbed/scanned/whatever at the checkpoint, but (in practice) only for people who would otherwise have 3 or more devices. Is that really such a significant number of passengers that it reduces the checkpoint workload from "impossible" to "possible"?

If past evidence is anything to go by, they're that stupid.
The idea, as it has been explained to me, is that 1+1 is that it permits the swabbing of the devices and keeps that number to a fixed amount (and eliminates some of the borderline cases of what is a phone). The thing is that this ban (if implemented) applies to all electronic (electrical) devices, not just phones and laptops. It would hit razors, noise cancelling headsets, iPods, iPads, detachable hard drives, cameras, flashlights, etc. The average traveler right now probably travels with 4-5 devices that will be hit with the ban. So dropping it to simply 2 devices will make the throughput at the checkpoint more manageable. I do believe that they (DHS) believe that swabbing will detect the explosives. The other thing is that 2 devices gives the appearance of managed risk.

The longer this drags on the more it seems to me that the other stakeholders are doing their best to defer or modify the underlying ban that is proposed. However, the latest round of messaging that is appearing has me convinced that DHS is just going to act on its own and give the proverbial finger to the rest of the world.
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