5 ms·

This is a pretty cynical viewpoint but I agree. It’s clear that TSA doesn’t do much. Someone I know has acidentially brought a pocketknife through security mul

This is a pretty cynical viewpoint but I agree. It’s clear that TSA doesn’t do much. Someone I know has acidentially brought a pocketknife through security multiple times without it being found. They keep it in my backpack as a regular item and just forgot to take it out.

monocasa 8y ago
I've literally brought a pickaxe by accident. But one time I was trying to bring a fish, and had a next to impossible time trying to get them to agree that water was a "life sustaining liquid" as defined by their exemptions on the 3oz rule wrt to fish.
- AlexCoventry 8y ago
  What exactly are they trying to prevent with the liquid prohibition, anyway?
  - javagram 8y ago
    Trying to prevent people carrying through chemicals that could be combined in the airplane bathroom to make explosives I believe. There was a terrorist plot to do this, which was caught by the security services, and then despite the terrorists being caught the liquids ban was put into place forever more to stop future attacks. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2006_transatlantic_aircraft_plot https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2006_transatlantic_aircraft_...
    - Godel_unicode 8y ago
      First, a slight clarification: while the main charge and the detonator were separated during transit and intended to be assembled on the plane, the explosive liquid itself was not a binary compound; it was live in the soft drink bottles. It sounds like you're arguing that this regulation is not necessary any more because that particular plot was foiled. I find that line of reasoning odd, given that the 2006 attack was the last in a string of plots using liquid explosives to target airliners. The type of group which carried out attacks like this still exists, with similar goals. Given that it's reasonably effective at deterring a technique which has actually been used (the Japan test run in the 90s) and which has been attempted multiple times, I think it's possibly the least objectionable regulation. It doesn't address all modes of attack (obviously), and it's very debatable whether the likelihood of attack makes the invasiveness of the countermeasure acceptable, but unlike body scanners it's at least effective at deterring the specific modality it's aimed at.
  - deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]
  - deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]
  - Moto7451 8y ago
    https://www.independent.co.uk/travel/news-and-advice/liquids-ban-on-flights-10th-anniversary-do-we-still-need-it-a7181216.html https://www.independent.co.uk/travel/news-and-advice/liquids... A pretty good summary and a bonus foreshadowing of this article. I have had a pretty good experience with the new scanners. I have global entry/Precheck and one remaining headache with the old scanners was remembering to take my double walked flask out and show the TSA that it was empty by removing the cap. The new scanners can see that it’s empty from inside my bag, which is very handy.
    - admax88q 8y ago
      I'm still fairly certain that the purpose of the liquid ban is purely to boost sales of toiletries, especially in small "travel size" containers. An entire new line of single use toiletry products was invented to meet this regulation.
      - Scoundreller 8y ago
        And some airports require that your liquids fit in a 1L bag. Which they’ll gladly sell to you.
        KozmoNau7 8y ago
        At least every airport I've been to (Europe, Dubai and India) have provided the 1L baggies for free. I usually get 4-5 uses out of them before they start tearing.
        dingaling 8y ago
        'baggies' is an interesting development in the English language, a colloquialism that is longer than its base word.
        KozmoNau7 8y ago
        It's just a diminutive form of "bag", ie. "small bags"? Just like you have for instance "telefonino" as the diminutive of "telefono" in Italian, literally "small telephone". And in German you add -chen or -lein to words to create the diminutive, so "Hund" becomes "Hündchen" (adding an umlaut as well, if applicable). Generally I think it's very common for a lot of languages to add a cutesy suffix to the base word, in order to create the diminutive.
  - Godel_unicode 8y ago
    Liquid explosives, it was inspired by the 2006 plot to bring down a transatlantic flight. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2006_transatlantic_aircraft_plot https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2006_transatlantic_aircraft_... https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5632982 https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=563298...
  - deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]
  - henrikschroder 8y ago
    They are preventing you from bringing drinks from the outside to boost the sales of drinks on the inside.
- rhizome 8y ago
  That reminds me of the time, sometime before the statute of limitations expired, I was coming back to the US from Montreal with a bunch of illegal raw milk cheese in my carry-on. No problem.
  - EForEndeavour 8y ago
    Are personal amounts of raw-milk cheese restricted or prohibited from entry into the US? This CBP page says nothing about raw cheese or pasteurization. It clearly states that hard and semi-soft cheeses are fine to bring in passenger baggage, as long as they don't contain meat. Just because the FDA requires raw-milk cheeses to have aged for at least 60 days in order to be sold in the USA, that doesn't mean you can't bring some in with you and consume it.
    - rhizome 8y ago
      My understanding was that all raw-milk cheese was banned in the US at the time.
ryen 8y ago
Freudian slip? =P
- caprese 8y ago
  depends on if you treat TSA like massage parlors: you know you are paying less than $100 bucks but you still aren't sure what you are going to get
- scarejunba 8y ago
  Haha that's what I thought too. "A friend" of his does this but puts it in "my backpack" and forgets. Sure. Friend.
KerryJones 8y ago
I had an emergency pocket knife at the bottom of my bag -- I totally forgot about it, I went through 2 US airports and 2 European airports before it was found in London. Our screening is worthless
- ttsda 8y ago
  London is crazy though. If the most minuscule thing is wrong about your luggage they'll pass it through every security check.
  - castillar76 8y ago
    Yep. The last few times I've been through London they've insisted on absolutely emptying my backpack because, and I quote, I had "carefully coiled cables in it". I'm an IT guy, I travel with a laptop, several devices for entertainment on a plane, chargers, etc. I promised them that next time I would toss the cables in haphazardly so as to prevent further issues. They were...unamused.
    - ttsda 8y ago
      And god forbid you had a drop of liquid inside, as they will swab every nook and cranny of you bag and put the samples through some kind of detector.
themagician 8y ago
I used to keep a rather large pocket knife clipped to the lighter pocket in my jeans. I accidentally took it through security a few times. Once when I was on the plane I was looking at it thinking, “Holy shit, how is this possible?” I looked it up and it turns out the scanners actually have a hard time seeing objects on your hip because of the way they scan. They are good at seeing objects in front of you or behind you, but an object perfectly aligned with the plane of your hips will often be missed.
Diederich 8y ago
I keep two pocket knives in my backpack, and I've accidentally brought them through security three times. And I have flown maybe a dozen times in the past 18 years.
MertsA 8y ago
I accidentally went through security with my infant son's boarding pass, separately from my wife and son who went through with my boarding pass, the TSA agent only checked my wife's boarding pass and not my son's. Not to mention how trivial it is to get liquids on a plane without them being searched. Bruce Schneier notably went through security with two of the biggest bottles of saline solution for contact lenses he could buy without them actually searching the bottles. When asked by the TSA why he had two bottles he told them "two eyes" and they let him through. Not to mention he was using a forged boarding pass at the time to go through security. https://www.schneier.com/news/archives/2008/11/the_things_he_carrie.html https://www.schneier.com/news/archives/2008/11/the_things_he... My wife was also wearing my son in a wrap at the time and just walked through a metal detector, no searching pockets or taking off the wrap or anything like that. Anyone trying to sneak contraband through could just carry it through with the baby knowing it won't be searched and then just leave after exchanging the contraband past security and walk out. You could easily sneak 10lbs worth of contraband through so long as it wouldn't set off the metal detector.
- Scoundreller 8y ago
  On the Canadian side, they’ve always swabbed my contact lens solution. Unfortunately, the UK doesn’t have the same simple exemption for contact lens solution bottles, so they seized it while I was transiting. There’s bit of irony from seizing something that anyone can fly in with.
ttsda 8y ago
A friend went through security twice with a couple of cooking gas canisters forgotten in their backpack. How aren't those the largest red flag of them all?

monocasa 8y ago

I've literally brought a pickaxe by accident. But one time I was trying to bring a fish, and had a next to impossible time trying to get them to agree that water was a "life sustaining liquid" as defined by their exemptions on the 3oz rule wrt to fish.

AlexCoventry 8y ago
What exactly are they trying to prevent with the liquid prohibition, anyway?
- javagram 8y ago
  Trying to prevent people carrying through chemicals that could be combined in the airplane bathroom to make explosives I believe. There was a terrorist plot to do this, which was caught by the security services, and then despite the terrorists being caught the liquids ban was put into place forever more to stop future attacks. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2006_transatlantic_aircraft_plot https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2006_transatlantic_aircraft_...
  - Godel_unicode 8y ago
    First, a slight clarification: while the main charge and the detonator were separated during transit and intended to be assembled on the plane, the explosive liquid itself was not a binary compound; it was live in the soft drink bottles. It sounds like you're arguing that this regulation is not necessary any more because that particular plot was foiled. I find that line of reasoning odd, given that the 2006 attack was the last in a string of plots using liquid explosives to target airliners. The type of group which carried out attacks like this still exists, with similar goals. Given that it's reasonably effective at deterring a technique which has actually been used (the Japan test run in the 90s) and which has been attempted multiple times, I think it's possibly the least objectionable regulation. It doesn't address all modes of attack (obviously), and it's very debatable whether the likelihood of attack makes the invasiveness of the countermeasure acceptable, but unlike body scanners it's at least effective at deterring the specific modality it's aimed at.
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
- Moto7451 8y ago
  https://www.independent.co.uk/travel/news-and-advice/liquids-ban-on-flights-10th-anniversary-do-we-still-need-it-a7181216.html https://www.independent.co.uk/travel/news-and-advice/liquids... A pretty good summary and a bonus foreshadowing of this article. I have had a pretty good experience with the new scanners. I have global entry/Precheck and one remaining headache with the old scanners was remembering to take my double walked flask out and show the TSA that it was empty by removing the cap. The new scanners can see that it’s empty from inside my bag, which is very handy.
  - admax88q 8y ago
    I'm still fairly certain that the purpose of the liquid ban is purely to boost sales of toiletries, especially in small "travel size" containers. An entire new line of single use toiletry products was invented to meet this regulation.
    - Scoundreller 8y ago
      And some airports require that your liquids fit in a 1L bag. Which they’ll gladly sell to you.
      - KozmoNau7 8y ago
        At least every airport I've been to (Europe, Dubai and India) have provided the 1L baggies for free. I usually get 4-5 uses out of them before they start tearing.
        dingaling 8y ago
        'baggies' is an interesting development in the English language, a colloquialism that is longer than its base word.
        KozmoNau7 8y ago
        It's just a diminutive form of "bag", ie. "small bags"? Just like you have for instance "telefonino" as the diminutive of "telefono" in Italian, literally "small telephone". And in German you add -chen or -lein to words to create the diminutive, so "Hund" becomes "Hündchen" (adding an umlaut as well, if applicable). Generally I think it's very common for a lot of languages to add a cutesy suffix to the base word, in order to create the diminutive.
- Godel_unicode 8y ago
  Liquid explosives, it was inspired by the 2006 plot to bring down a transatlantic flight. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2006_transatlantic_aircraft_plot https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2006_transatlantic_aircraft_... https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5632982 https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=563298...
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
- henrikschroder 8y ago
  They are preventing you from bringing drinks from the outside to boost the sales of drinks on the inside.
rhizome 8y ago
That reminds me of the time, sometime before the statute of limitations expired, I was coming back to the US from Montreal with a bunch of illegal raw milk cheese in my carry-on. No problem.
- EForEndeavour 8y ago
  Are personal amounts of raw-milk cheese restricted or prohibited from entry into the US? This CBP page says nothing about raw cheese or pasteurization. It clearly states that hard and semi-soft cheeses are fine to bring in passenger baggage, as long as they don't contain meat. Just because the FDA requires raw-milk cheeses to have aged for at least 60 days in order to be sold in the USA, that doesn't mean you can't bring some in with you and consume it.
  - rhizome 8y ago
    My understanding was that all raw-milk cheese was banned in the US at the time.

ryen 8y ago

Freudian slip? =P

caprese 8y ago
depends on if you treat TSA like massage parlors: you know you are paying less than $100 bucks but you still aren't sure what you are going to get
scarejunba 8y ago
Haha that's what I thought too. "A friend" of his does this but puts it in "my backpack" and forgets. Sure. Friend.

KerryJones 8y ago

I had an emergency pocket knife at the bottom of my bag -- I totally forgot about it, I went through 2 US airports and 2 European airports before it was found in London. Our screening is worthless

ttsda 8y ago
London is crazy though. If the most minuscule thing is wrong about your luggage they'll pass it through every security check.
- castillar76 8y ago
  Yep. The last few times I've been through London they've insisted on absolutely emptying my backpack because, and I quote, I had "carefully coiled cables in it". I'm an IT guy, I travel with a laptop, several devices for entertainment on a plane, chargers, etc. I promised them that next time I would toss the cables in haphazardly so as to prevent further issues. They were...unamused.
  - ttsda 8y ago
    And god forbid you had a drop of liquid inside, as they will swab every nook and cranny of you bag and put the samples through some kind of detector.

themagician 8y ago

I used to keep a rather large pocket knife clipped to the lighter pocket in my jeans. I accidentally took it through security a few times. Once when I was on the plane I was looking at it thinking, “Holy shit, how is this possible?” I looked it up and it turns out the scanners actually have a hard time seeing objects on your hip because of the way they scan. They are good at seeing objects in front of you or behind you, but an object perfectly aligned with the plane of your hips will often be missed.

Diederich 8y ago

I keep two pocket knives in my backpack, and I've accidentally brought them through security three times. And I have flown maybe a dozen times in the past 18 years.

MertsA 8y ago

I accidentally went through security with my infant son's boarding pass, separately from my wife and son who went through with my boarding pass, the TSA agent only checked my wife's boarding pass and not my son's. Not to mention how trivial it is to get liquids on a plane without them being searched. Bruce Schneier notably went through security with two of the biggest bottles of saline solution for contact lenses he could buy without them actually searching the bottles. When asked by the TSA why he had two bottles he told them "two eyes" and they let him through. Not to mention he was using a forged boarding pass at the time to go through security. https://www.schneier.com/news/archives/2008/11/the_things_he_carrie.html https://www.schneier.com/news/archives/2008/11/the_things_he... My wife was also wearing my son in a wrap at the time and just walked through a metal detector, no searching pockets or taking off the wrap or anything like that. Anyone trying to sneak contraband through could just carry it through with the baby knowing it won't be searched and then just leave after exchanging the contraband past security and walk out. You could easily sneak 10lbs worth of contraband through so long as it wouldn't set off the metal detector.

Scoundreller 8y ago
On the Canadian side, they’ve always swabbed my contact lens solution. Unfortunately, the UK doesn’t have the same simple exemption for contact lens solution bottles, so they seized it while I was transiting. There’s bit of irony from seizing something that anyone can fly in with.

ttsda 8y ago

A friend went through security twice with a couple of cooking gas canisters forgotten in their backpack. How aren't those the largest red flag of them all?