Liquid explosive screening devices arriving at the airports, October
- Thread starter mpenguin1
- Start date
mpenguin1
Well-Known Member
Actually, I think you are just launching into an attack, to simply attack. Up until this time, the word Liquid Explosives was never mentioned, just powered explosives & with the new threat, *BAM*, all of sudden everybody wants to know why we were not prepared for a Liquid Explosive threat.
As Doug mentioned, Liquid Explosives have been around for quite some time, since the 1800's, just that the threat was not practical.
Yeah, I know, your next comment will be, "we should have been prepared".
My comment to that, is that when this blows over, there is going to be another threat, & another, & another. And the same people will repeat themselves & say that we should have been prepared.
As for a standard for Liquid Explosives, technology is just catching up to that, there probably was technology that could detect normal Liquid Explosives such as Nitroglycerine, but, not what these Terrorist had in mind, which was using industrial strength peroxides......
kellwolf
Piece of Trash
I'd be willing to cut DHS some slack, if I had actually seen any improvements in the last 5 years. So far, other than increasing manpower and decreasing what you can carry-on, I haven't seen a whole hell of a lot. I'd love to be able to say "Well, we didn't plan on liquid explosives, but look how far we've come in other areas since 9/11," but I simply can't. Other than federalizing the screeners (which was SUPPOSED to make it more consistent, yet giving the individual airport directors a lot of leeway nixed that), I really don't see a lot of difference b/w Argenbreit pre-9/11 and TSA post-9/11.
I started this whole airline gig back in 1996 and in ten years, it's not really all that different at all.
The problem is, security decisions are made by people who really aren't in the system. You have CEO's that hire a "VP of Security" send him off to DC to talk to other "VP's of Security" in a roundtable discussion of elected officials on "Aviation Security Task Forces" who have no practical experience.
More or less, but you know what I'm getting at.
If you really want to improve security, you've got to fold-in pilots, flight attendants, gate agents, mechanics and rampers and ask, "What security holes do you see? How do we improve them?"
I see huge gaping holes in security every day at every single airport. I know if i can see them, you can rest assured that the bad guys know about them and are planning to exploit them.
Remember, one of the British bomb plot suspects was an airport employee with a SIDA badge, how'd THAT happen?
Easy.
Scarily easy.
mpenguin1
Well-Known Member
Doug
Well, I started in the aviation back in 1991, been travelling on airplanes since about 6 years old.
To compare Airport Security now, vs, Pre-9/11, I would have to say that hands down it is a hell of a lot better.
What people don't realize is that airport security is more than just the TSA, which is what people see, the man defense of airport security resides with Homeline Defense Department, which most people don't even deal with.
This has to do with background checks before issuance of visas, and an assportment of other things.
Prior to 9/11, the turnaround time for most people from Middle eastern countries for a visa, could be done in about 24 hours, no background checks, no checks of any kind, the same pilot could come to the United States for pilot training, with once again, no securty checks of any kind. That loophole has been shut.
Did you realize that in some countries when your passport expires & it is renewed, they issue another passport with a different number, or in some countries, people have more than 1 passport and sometimes with different last names, or in another countries, people have 2 birth certificates...
Doug
As for what you said about drafting the Pilots/Flight Attendants/Mechanics to be another set of eyes, you are 100% correct dead on, in fact the TSA asked for the assistance from the airlines. The airlines in turn gave the TSA the finger.
kellwolf
Piece of Trash
To me, this doesn't help AIRPORT security. Security in the training environemnt, yes, but not necessarily the airport. After working in two different international airports in a variety of positions, like Doug, I see a LOT of glaring loopholes just waiting to be exploited. But, at least we won't have to worry about Aunt Bessie in 13A spilling her makeup bag in the aisle.
The part that chafes my hide is that you see glaring holes, I see glaring holes, but the people making security decisions continue to turn a blind eye.
We'll see press releases about how "safe" things are since 9/11, how many things have changed, yadda yadda yadda, but meanwhile, nothing has changed or improved.
But how many billions have we thrown at security over the past 5 years? Ooh I wish I could speak more frankly, but I'm not. It almost makes me angry just thinking about it.
We'll see press releases about how "safe" things are since 9/11, how many things have changed, yadda yadda yadda, but meanwhile, nothing has changed or improved.
But how many billions have we thrown at security over the past 5 years? Ooh I wish I could speak more frankly, but I'm not. It almost makes me angry just thinking about it.
tonyw
Well-Known Member
How can you say this was not practical when they actually carried out an attack using liquid explosives back in the 1990s?
Come on, Pengy, you even get to blame the evil Clinton once again if you do your homework. I told you that an airplane was forced to land at Okinawa because someone blew up a bomb on the plane and killed a Japanese businessman.
But you're going to tell me it wasn't practical?
You are smarter than that.
And even if it "wasn't practical" to detonate bombs made with liquid explosives, which the terrorist incident back in the 1990s kind of shoots down, that simply doesn't address the FACT that FIVE FREAKING YEARS after September 11, Jerkoff and the rest of the department of homeland (in)security haven't gotten a bleeping standard for explosive detection done.