Pesky Monkey

All 3 of which are useless.

FlyingUnderTheRadar

There may be easier targets but any action that affects the airline industry affects millions of people everyday around the world. That is pretty significant but in no way should diminish attacks such as the recent one in Manchester.

That said, nefarious devices hidden in carry on laptops does not seem to me to be an effective mechanism. Devices hidden in a body cavity by multiple people then assembled within the secure zone of an airport IMHO has been the weak link for many years.

chollie

There's still the gaping hole of airport workers and TSOs.

TSA can bleat that there hasn't been an instance yet of an American TSO being involved in a terrorist act. Faking scans to allow sexual groping beyond what is already permitted, participating in drug and cash and weapons smuggling, but not terrorist acts.

However, IIRC, the Sinai bombing was the result of a rigged laptop passed off to a pax post-security by an airport worker.

There's been one instance of an underpants bomber, but now all US pax genitals are subject to intimate rubs and even exposure. There was an episode involving a shoe bomber and the US is still hung up on footwear. There was talk of a failed liquids plot, and years later, our cans of soda are still prohibited even though the former head of TSA has said that there is zero need for an LGA ban and hasn't been for years.

Those single pax incidents resulted in security for pax being made even more invasive and cumbersome - but not more effective. Meanwhile, we have already witnessed a terrorist attack involving airport workers circumventing security, and in the US, our TSOs still walk in and out of secured areas unchallenged.

Why is that? Why, in spite of evidence to the contrary, are TSOs and airport workers still largely exempt from the hassles ordinary pax go through, even though they are clearly the greater threat?

The same quotas that some airports use to dictate how many pax get their genitals groped should be doubled and applied to on-duty TSOs. If 10% of pax who don't alarm get the genital rub then 20% of TSOs (including LTSOs and STSOs) should get the genital rub every day.

inet32

I don't know about that. From Wikipedia:
29 October 2010 Cargo planes bomb plot A failed al-Qaeda plastic-explosive bombing attempt on a UPS and a FedEx cargo plane bound to the United States. The bombs, concealed in packages originating in Yemen, were discovered at stop-overs a result of shared intelligence. It is believed the bombs were intended to be detonated over a US city.[11] 0

31 October 2015 Metrojet Flight 9268 An Airbus A321 flying from Egypt to Saint Petersburg broke-up above the Sinai, killing everyone on board, becoming the deadliest air disaster in Russian history. ISIL claimed responsibility. Russian investigators found explosive residue and Egyptian authorities agreed it was a terrorist act.

2 February 2016 Daallo Airlines Flight 159 An Airbus A321 suffered an explosion shortly after taking off from Mogadishu, opening a hole in the fuselage through which the burnt body of the suicide bomber fell. The airliner was able to safely conduct an emergency landing. Militant group Al-Shabaab claimed responsibility

... I think the threat is real enough; I just don't have any confidence that HSA/TSA's proposals net out to overall better safety.

artemis

That will be an absolute nightmare. I can't even begin to imagine what having to Fed Ex my camera equipment everywhere would cost.

FL390

It's worse than that. You can't just FedEx camera gear to another country without a customs broker and a temporary import bond.

I just want them make something formal so I can plan the rest of my year. I'm waiting to book a trip to Asia this fall.

TWA884

Reminder!

The subject of this thread is a possible electronic devices ban on international flights to (and from?) the US.

This has nothing to do with the "gaping hole of airport workers and TSOs," American TSOs being involved in a terrorist acts, faking scans to allow sexual groping,, participating in drug and cash and weapons smuggling, etc., etc., etc.

Please stay on topic!
TWA884
Travel Safety/Security co-moderator

richarddd

Wouldn't you just have to FedEx your batteries, rather than the actual camera gear?

GUWonder

Kelly wants the ban to hit what is about half a million flyers a year, all international passengers to/from the US. What a foolish idea.

petaluma1

It's got to be far more than half a million!

JakiChan

The beauty is that the headlines call it a laptop ban, and they're right. The articles usually spell out the detail that it will be a ban from the cabin but they leave out the part where the Europeans will ban them from the cargo hold (and rightly so) thus leading to a total ban.

This will do more damage than the terrorists could have dreamed. Their ROI on this is through the roof, thanks to the TSA.

GrayAnderson

LON-NYC alone is 4.2m pax/yr and if you go with the Europe-US pairs in the top ten overall you're looking at 8.2m or so overall there. My guess is, excluding Canada, you're looking at somewhere in the ballpark of 20m pax/yr. Now, granted you've got some businesspeople who will go back and forth 20 times (and each round trip is 2 "passengers")...but that's a minority.

My guess? 20-22m passenger trips involving about 4-5m individual travelers.

(Edit: But I could easily be way low because of the sheer number of pairs involved. The number could easily be double.)

Boggie Dog

I found one source stating 325,000 enter the US by air daily.

artemis

No, the camera bodies (and possibly the lenses) would have to be checked as they are electronics larger than a cell phone. And they'd be at risk of being stolen.

MSY-MSP

If the ban is imposed on all flights out of the US then the ban will be to all flights in the US as well. The US has no means to implement a ban to just the flights leaving the US without a significant increase in personnel or redesigning the airports such that there is a completely separate checkpoint and secure area for just flights outside the US.

What Kelly is saying is wholly consistent with what I have heard and what i have posted here previously. The ban is coming, its just the technical details have to be worked out. It won't be pleasant. There are several technical details that are holding it up as the best I can understand it.
1) EU prohibitions/reluctance to allow the items in the cargo hold.
2) The US insistence that they all go into the hold.
3) Need to provide coverage to the airlines based on Insurers refusing to cover electronics in the hold.
4) Management of the electronic devices at the checkpoint. I strongly believe the 10 (domestic) city trial is cover for the banning of the devices at the checkpoint. Come out and say the number of devices is too many to process at the checkpoint, thus a ban is the only way to keep the checkpoints moving. Sorry folks....

I have truly believed, based on what I was hearing that the limitation would be 1+1, but now I am starting to believe that may not be the case, and that a complete ban on electronic devices may be on its way, at least until they can find funding to buy the CT based machines for the checkpoints.