5 ms·

What would be the alternative?

• ChickenNugger 4y ago
  Why do we need an alternative? Air travel existed for decades without it. Here's a more in-depth article on it: https://www.forbes.com/sites/ellistalton/2019/01/28/is-the-tsa-really-necessary/?sh=303c5b3025e0 https://www.forbes.com/sites/ellistalton/2019/01/28/is-the-t...
• mikecoles 4y ago
  The previous solution.
• somebody78978 4y ago
  We don't need an alternative. I've never understood why we need to go through security to board an airplane, but not to board a train.
  • jxramos 4y ago
    probably the likely outcomes of terrorism. On a plane the whole thing is demolished in a crash because of the kinetic energy involved in colliding with the earth. For a train probably not the same degree of destruction is attainable unless you like bomb a bridge or something of the sort.
    • mitthrowaway2 4y ago
      > More than thirty buildings in Lac-Mégantic's town centre, roughly half of the downtown area, were destroyed, and all but three of the thirty-nine remaining buildings had to be demolished due to petroleum contamination of the townsite. Initial newspaper reports described a 1 km (0.6-mile) blast radius. Not terrorism, just negligence -- but a train can do a lot of damage: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lac-M%C3%A9gantic_rail_disaster https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lac-M%C3%A9gantic_rail_disaste...
      • jxramos 4y ago
        wow, yah if you're carrying hazardous material that changes the calculus for sure.
  • sangnoir 4y ago
    9/11. If anyone ever uses a train to ram into the Pentagon, expect the security / security theater for trains to be scaled up as well.
    • gpm 4y ago
      Assuming someone managed to hijack a bunch of planes again, I doubt they could reproduce 9/11. The government would shoot them down. Sure they could kill everyone on the plane, but a train has more passengers than a plane, and a determined terrorist could probably kill everyone on a train.
      • blep_ 4y ago
        Notably, there are ways to do so without being on the train, which probably increases the number of people willing to do it.
      • from 4y ago
        > Assuming someone managed to hijack a bunch of planes again, I doubt they could reproduce 9/11. The government would shoot them down. They don't really need to hijack planes, they just need a few hundred thousand dollars and a NetJets account. Also, if you read some of the BlueLeaks documents you can tell the government is very worried about vehicle ramming attacks. The unfortunate truth is that anyone with a little bit of money and willingness to die for a cause if coordinated can cause massive amounts of damage. We are lucky that most terrorists aren't that smart.
    • Arainach 4y ago
      Security theater has no impact. 9/11 had two important outcomes: locking the cockpit door and making passengers aware that hijackers will crash the plane rather than detour it to South America, ensuring that they will never again assume that sitting back and letting the hijackers do what they want is acceptable. THOSE things made air travel safer. Body scanners and confiscating pocketknives did not.
      • 93po 4y ago
• hadlock 4y ago
  Same as the rest of the world, metal detector and possibly luggage scan of larger luggage. US airline security is a ridiculous jobs program for the most part. People have been using the phrase "security theater" since the TSA was invented, and with good reason. Taking your shoes off at security is outrageous, no other country requires this on a regular basis.
• htag 4y ago
  It's strange that every commercial airplane passenger has an interaction with a federal employee. This isn't true for busses, trains, ferries, cabs, or any other mass transit system. It feels like something more appropriate for an airport employee, with local PD on premises.
• johngladtj 4y ago
  Not having it.