READ!! Why i got called a TERRORIST and downed flight

[grim]

Had to write this, because i was stick of tellin the story..and also let people know to be carefull of those flight attendants still living in the paranoia of 9/11. Often time fear outweighs common sense

a couple of years ago, i was flying from philly to montana and had asked my two oldest girls what they would like me to bring them. one replied that she would like a large chunk of REAL blue cheese. the other told me that she wanted a REAL philly cheesesteak.

to keep this short, i'll just cut to the chase...

at the screening area, the dog hit on my sandwich and i got slammed against a wall while they ripped my (her) cheesesteak sandwich to shreads. (btw -- this is not an easy task since i'm a rather large fellow, but in my defense, they caught me off guard.)

so i spend some time admiring the view with a forearm pressed against my throat. once they determine that sometimes a sandwich IS just a sandwich and were making a second pass on my baggage, the g----mned dog hit on the cheese!

so, i was slammed back about 60cm into the wall and once again, mr larynx said hello to mr forearm. the cheese was torn into dust by their ungloved fingers (as was the sandwich earlier). once they had determined that it was indeed a (now) pile of actually, honest and for-reals bleu cheese, they offered the pile of cheese-powder back to me with their apologies.

i declined the return and considered myself lucky that i wasn't smuggling doggy treats in my speedos.

[raimundo]

those simpleminded comic opera thugs don't provide security, they are there to spread the fear that along with hate provides votes to republican grafters.

[bryan1656]

wow.... interesting story.

There's plenty of stupid security stories.. they'd be funy except some of them just.... well, they are ust kind of sad.

Here's one of my favorite killing-time links. Held keep me in "truth to power" mode. (Which is hard to stay in when you have a client wanting to pay you big bucks for something stupid and pointless.)

http://www.stupidsecurity.com/

[Kaellman]

My best friends brother went to usa with his family and brought a screwdriver. He didnt get it confiscated until they entered the statue of liberty. USA in a f***ing nut-shell.

[Jaakko]

My best friends brother went to usa with his family and brought a screwdriver. He didnt get it confiscated until they entered the statue of liberty.

I think they were afraid that he might disassemble the statue of liberty with his screwdriver

[Kaellman]

Ye rather the wing of a plane than their precious statue! Seriously, if it was sharpened he could have killed with that thing.

[Bittersweet]

Heh, I've had my picks mis-identified as "little knives" before. Luckily my classmates realized what they actually were before they freaked out.
Ah, good times, good times.

[frizzen]

I like the story, even if there is debate about if it happened. Knowing F/As and the TSA, I'd probably believe it.

What type of plane were you on? (sorry I'm an Airframe and Powerplant Mechanic, I have an unhealthy interest in planes.) As for getting onto the flight deck, there's more to it than just that lock cylinder.

[drunk.with.love]

That, my friend, is hilarious hahahah... It's understandable, though still ridiculously sad.

You should've said, "Real terrorists wouldn't be idiotic enough to take out their 'little knives' and start playing with them, would they now, genius?"

I do feel for you though, god that must've been frustrating.

[quicksilver]

It could just be my nature but there is something that bothered me a bit about this story. The story takes place in April of 2007 wherein policies and procedures regarding risk assessment, intervention, & reporting have all be established. The pilot makes a public announcement that a security threat has been identified within the confines of an airborne aircraft.....
That a flight attendant makes a heated error in judgment is not beyond belief but that the pilot goes along with this assessment and then makes a public statement to the passengers to that effect is troubling.

Would there not be a "check, double-check" procedure in place to keep this from happening? Would there not be an investigative element assigned to each flight to check if there were real trouble? If an error of this magnitude were to occur as easily as reported could this not occur on a daily basis from most any incident wherein an object is questionable? Is there not an air-marshal presence established now as a standard for both foreign and domestic flights?

Public statements regarding security breach issues are a major no-no in that they put into motion less qualified "reactions" to this breach than if the issue were kept contained. Massive amounts of money and legal liability may well hinge on (not only) the handling of the issue but it's validity. Would a public airline be so cavalier in it's handling of something so important? It would seem if answers to this query are "yes" then they would happen quite frequently.

And if that is the case....to heck with flying!

[indi]

It could just be my nature but there is something that bothered me a bit about this story. The story takes place in April of 2007 wherein policies and procedures regarding risk assessment, intervention, & reporting have all be established. The pilot makes a public announcement that a security threat has been identified within the confines of an airborne aircraft.....
That a flight attendant makes a heated error in judgment is not beyond belief but that the pilot goes along with this assessment and then makes a public statement to the passengers to that effect is troubling.

Would there not be a "check, double-check" procedure in place to keep this from happening? Would there not be an investigative element assigned to each flight to check if there were real trouble? If an error of this magnitude were to occur as easily as reported could this not occur on a daily basis from most any incident wherein an object is questionable? Is there not an air-marshal presence established now as a standard for both foreign and domestic flights?

Public statements regarding security breach issues are a major no-no in that they put into motion less qualified "reactions" to this breach than if the issue were kept contained. Massive amounts of money and legal liability may well hinge on (not only) the handling of the issue but it's validity. Would a public airline be so cavalier in it's handling of something so important? It would seem if answers to this query are "yes" then they would happen quite frequently.

And if that is the case....to heck with flying!

My point exactly. What happened to training, saftey checks, call and response.... and what teh hell were they doing bringing me back to the gate. Really.... this is absurd. I wish i could see the training program.

[UWSDWF]

sooo are you here to be a productive member of the site or just to rant and rave about airport security?

[Legion303]

Yeah, hippie, cough up the skills. :)

-steve

[Mr. Glass]

Wow, wish I wasn't so busy these days and could have read this one sooner. Indi: thanks for one of the most interesting threads I've seen in a long time!

[Dooms_day]

ha googled and found chris' myspace, i had to see his face to imagine him looking like a terrorist. that guy who told you to sit down, i would of walked up to him after the flight and see what he had to say....then i would of told him to get outta my face