4 ms·
The bit that worked though, both for this and Richard Reid's shoe bomb, was that passengers - not air marshals - noticed the terrorist trying to set light to so
by eftpotrm 16y ago
The bit that worked though, both for this and Richard Reid's shoe bomb, was that passengers - not air marshals - noticed the terrorist trying to set light to something in the main cabin area.
All it takes is a terrorist bright enough to try and set light to their bomb in the toilet rather than sitting surrounded by other passengers while fiddling with a fuse and lighter, and the system has failed. These attacks are failing because the chosen attackers are stupid, not because the system is effective.
Air Marshals. 4.2 arrests per year average, $200m per arrest. A very, very expensive comfort blanket.
- zealog 16y agoThe author of the article is the one who rightly explains that the only thing that has made us safer since 9/11 is locking cockpit doors and the knowledge that passengers should not comply with terrorists. In fact, that last one was learned so quickly it disrupted the 4th plane of that very attack. Everything else is security theater.
- cookiecaper 16y agoI don't know that you could really get away with it in the lavatory either. Those smoke detectors are meant to stop people from having a cigarette, which doesn't necessarily emit that much smoke, so they're probably tuned to be pretty sensitive, right? But yeah, I assume the guy wouldn't really care if he was going to blow up the plane; attendants probably aren't in the habit of storming the lavatory when the smoke detector goes off.