Fredd

http://radio.foxnews.com/toddstarnes...heelchair.html

yknot

local TV is picking it up:

http://wtvr.com/2013/02/20/tsa-apolo...in-wheelchair/

fwoomp

"Inaccurate guidance?" I don't even know where to start with that.

Fredd

Heh... The Department of Euphemisms labored hard to come up with that one.

exbayern

And it's hit at least one major Disney travel forum and predictably, the first response is that the parents are to blame for not adequately preparing the child.

Readers of the Daily Mail too blame the parents. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...=feeds-newsxml

I actually think that this story will be viewed as the vast majority of others by the US public: the passenger was at fault, it's the price we have to pay, if you don't like it don't fly, etc.

jkhuggins

With the way that TSA usually responds to these sorts of incidents, this is practically an admission of guilt.

What the use of passive voice in the statement here accomplishes is avoiding specific assignment of blame at this particular moment. We don't know if the fault lies directly with the TSO(s) doing the screening, who should have known better, or with their supervisors and instructors, who should have trained them better. I suspect that TSA simply doesn't know either. Rather than make a statement that they'd have to retract later, TSA is sticking with the facts they know: the information given to the family was incorrect.

Plus, TSA used the word "apology" directly, rather than trying to deflect the blame off the agency and onto the passengers.

Plus, TSA didn't use the tired old "this one incident does not reflect on the thousands of good TSOs" rejoinder we've gotten used to seeing.

On the whole, as apologies go, this was pretty good. (Yes, they shouldn't have screwed up in the first place, which would have eliminated the need for an apology.)

Global_Hi_Flyer

A lot of the sheeple on those forums are AFS types. Think of TSA as modern-day patent medicine.

Fredd

^ I read a Reader's Digest anecdote many decades ago about a woman in some rural area at a traveling public health van with an X-Ray machine to screen for TB. She missed the point and was lining up to go through it for the third time, because after the first two "treatments" she was already feeling better.

She would have loved the TSA.

exbayern

Oh, believe me, I understand that. I was just responding to the sentiment that Disney would use this to pressure TSA to change their policies. That won't happen, because if security is reduced or changed to be like in rest of world many average American leisure travellers will be afraid to fly, negatively impacting Disney's attendance. And those sites represent the majority of travellers; FT and TS&S does not. Read the comments on the UK low brow news websites; they agree pretty much with the other leisure sites.

What annoys me is how this woman is being roasted on various websites and in comments for being a 'bad parent' who didn't prepare her child. Who knows how much they talked about it before hand, and for how long? When I was three, when Bunny was lost I was traumatised. This child has a serious medical disorder and most likely has had a difficult first few years of life; it isn't surprising that she may have been more upset than another child to lose her comfort toy, even if she was prepared that it may happen. Nobody knows what went before the video, and for how long the parents prepared her to fly.

People aren't questioning the process; they are too busy blaming the parents instead of blaming the system. Nobody seems to ask where are the HHMD in American airports? If TSA has not discarded them a few years ago, those in wheelchairs would be checked differently than they are in American airports. They still exist in 'rest of world'.

Is there an age at which a mother is denied carrying her child through the WTMD if the child cannot walk? If a mother is permitted to carry a healthy toddler, or sleeping child (as I saw last week at an airport) through the WTMD, why can a mother not carry a very young child who is unable to walk through the WTMD?

Why does checking a wheelchair for explosives not mean swabbing the chair while someone is seated? If they did that, plus use a HHMD, then concerns people have about using a cushion to hide a bomb would surely be reduced.

Why did TSA issue an apology and acknowledge failures so quickly this time, when in past it took weeks or months and then some serious backpedalling (sometimes in cases I think were actually worse, or more obviously wrong)? Is it because they realised that there was no way to deny this video? The mother barely showed the TSOs; she remained calm throughout. The TSO however was not truthful about their own policy.

This woman is being judged for her parenting skills, but there seems to be a general air of 'this is the world in which we live' and that 'we have to put up with this in order to fly'.

This isn't the 'world'; and we don't have to put up with this to fly.

saulblum

Yep, read the comments at ABC's article and prepare to vomit.

http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/lifestyl...abled-toddler/

The ABC News ends though on a cheerful notice:

Government workers threatened to feel up little Lucy and threatened her mom with arrest, but it's all good, because she got to meet Mickey Mouse!

Fredd

^ How do you prepare a three-year-old adequately for the noise and strangers and general chaos that pervades many check points, not to mention what might actually happen to the child, depending on the decisions of the big strangers in blue?

We recently flew by ourselves with a five-year-old granddaughter and found it an onerous responsibility to explain to her what might occur at the check point. We had her nearly a thousand miles from home for five days, visiting Disneyland, eating in restaurants, staying in a hotel, and "preparing her" for the TSA check point - and thinking what might possibly happen outside of our control - was our main concern.

That's not right.

exbayern

I said that earlier today to someone I consider a friend (and who may be lurking here) but who doesn't always share my opinion on these matters.

On another thread I posted how two weeks ago I landed in the US and was shocked at the constant noise and the constant shouting from landing, walk to immigration, immigration queue, baggage claim, customs exit, baggage drop, and the security queue. It overwhelmed me; I can't imagine what it is like for someone who has sensory issues, or for a child, or just generally anyone who isn't used to that chaos found in US airports.

I'd forgotten how bad it was at US airports even though I'd been through one just a few weeks before, and I landed on a very quiet day in low season.

Loren Pechtel

That makes sense.

Caradoc

What the TSA calls "inaccurate guidance" is what the rest of the world refers to as "lying your butt off."

Boggie Dog

If the TSA employes(s) didn't give a public "inaccurate guidance" excuse to the people then nothing of benefit happened.

TSA employees should be fined for lying and poor performance leading uop to dismissal. Foul up once get docked a weeks pay, second time a months pay, third and walk.