Originally Posted by Fredd
This brings up a question I have. On previous European trips over the past three years I have noticed the less obtrusive security. Once a screener at CDG more-or-less snickered when I asked if I should take my shoes off. Yet when we flew out of MUC earlier this month it was shoes off, belt off, the whole nine yards. I still set off the alarm and was frisked fairly cozily. I wasn't the only one. That was followed up by a fairly long list of questions when we picked up our boarding passes. I even asked an FA about the change but she said they went through a separate crew line and she didn't know.
Is this new? Is it because we were on a UA flight, or because it was a flight into IAD? Is it peculiar to MUC? It was a much more thorough screening than the TSA's at IAD several hours later. We have European trips booked in January and February (France and Italy/Germany) so I'd be interested in knowing in advance if that's the new reality.
The honest truth to this is varying policies on what will be or appear to be "effective security."
At Munich, you probably don't realize it, but they employ alternative methods for selecting a person for screening, which include facial hair, skin color, etc. This is a very effective way in combination with other profiling methods when done by highly skilled professionals. In the US, such profiling is not constitutionally allowable. So the shoe thing, which came about due to Richard Reid, could have been prevented two ways. Either screen RR due to his looks (which would not have been difficult) or screen his shoes. Since the former would not have been allowed had he originated at a US airport, the retrospective "retroproactive" stance of the US has opted for the latter. Hence, the shoe carnival at US airports and other airports that do not permit effective racial profiling.