New travel restrictions

[geargrrl]

I apologize if I offended you toughgirl, but to be completely honest, you would be the first regular traveler that I've heard who has your opinion.

It's one thing for the once or twice a year travelers to be inconvenienced by losing another hour or two to security lines and losing more personal freedoms. It's something else entirely for those who have to travel weekly or even daily. That's a whole lot of wasted time and inconvenience for those people. Especially when the restrictions being put in place are primarily for show and really wouldn't do anything to stop any type of serious attack. And, as pointed out before, risks of highway travel are much higher and more dangerous than those of air travel.

My next door neighbor just retired from being an international, commercial pilot. He had the NY-Paris route for years. He is pretty much of the same opinion as above. His solution was a little extreme ( fly with his firearms and not lock the cabin/cockpit doors) but then again he was a former Navy Seal guy.

 

[vanhoskier]

In effect, the restrictions mean that passengers on flights of 90 minutes or less would most likely not be able to leave their seats at all, since airlines do not allow passengers to walk around the cabin while a plane is climbing to its cruising altitude."

***

This would be a huge problem for me as my bladder tends to sense that I am on a plane and goes into overdrive! Yipes!

 

[vanhoskier]

This came on the news service of my internet provider today:

Absolute Chaos' at Nyc Airports; Innocent Fliers: Tsa Has Gone Plane Insane
The New York Post
2009-12-29
By CAROLYN SALAZAR; BETH STEBNER; AMBER SUTHERLAND; TOM NAMAKO

Airline passengers thwarted the Christmas Day terror plot - and now passengers are getting the shaft. International fliers are falling victim to insanely repetitive security questions, invasive pat-downs and overzealous flight attendants who restrict their every move, passengers fumed yesterday. "They were asking us what we had for lunch," said Long Island resident Jim Hyndman, whose flight from Brussels to JFK was delayed an hour because of the massive security line. Walter Saraniecki, 25, a trader who lives in Chelsea and took a flight from Prague to JFK, said, "They interviewed every single person. They were hassling people who didn't speak English. They were asking stupid questions." Most passengers decried the dual security checks at airports, where Transportation Security Administration agents were instructed in an internal memo to check every single carry-on bag and use "behavior detection" questions on every passenger. At the Toronto airport yesterday morning, every US-bound passenger was subjected to a pat-down, and luggage was inspected by hand. Officials there have banned most carry-on luggage for fliers headed to the United States. "It was absolute chaos," said Brooke Rai, 23, a student from New Jersey who slogged through security at JFK. "There was no organization - people were cutting lines, agents were rude. It was just chaos." The most humiliating measures included a directive to pat down everyone, a procedure that many passengers said came startlingly close to areas no stranger should go. "I got patted down, and it's too personal! They really go for your personal areas," said Sam Lazarus, 24, a student from Park Slope, Brooklyn. JetBlue went so far as to shut off its popular 36-channel live-TV and satellite-radio entertainment system over the weekend. The feds didn't want an airborne attacker to see a channel displaying a flight's location, sources told The Post. The system was restored yesterday. The measures were implemented on Friday, when Nigerian Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, 23, tried to blow up a Northwest Airlines plane as it approached Detroit. While passengers said some in-flight restrictions - like not allowing anyone to use the restroom or have blankets and pillows one hour before landing - were eased, they noted flight attendants mostly adhered to the overbearing rules. "A guy tried to get something from his bag in the last hour of the flight and a stewardess ran after him and moved him to the front of the plane," said Anna Shikhman, a 46-year-old who took a flight from Istanbul to JFK yesterday. "They took our pillows and blankets in light of the events, and said we couldn't move until the final stop," she added. A spokesman for the Port Authority said there was no increase in delayed flights in the New York area yesterday. But fliers said it was just a matter of time before tensions between them and security agents and flight crews reached a boiling point. On one US Airways flight from Puerto Vallarta, Mexico, to Phoenix, passenger James Van Dellen snapped a photo of a long line of fliers clogging the aisles of a plane to get to the restroom - all to beat the new restrictions. "I found it stupefying how one rule - 'Don't congregate in aisles and galleys' - is so easily forgotten in lieu of another," Van Dellen said. Chris Milo, 39, a recording artist from Williamsburg, Brooklyn, who flew from Lisbon to Newark, said, "Just when we thought we were getting past the shoe-bomber guy, this jerk comes along and makes flying awful again. "I was watching a movie and they made me turn it off in the middle. The only thing that's left now is for everyone to get a full cavity search," he added. The TSA does have plans to roll out "whole body" devices that use "millimeter waves" to detect any banned materials on a passenger, an agency source said. About 40 are installed now at 19 airports, and the TSA wants to deploy 150 by early in 2010, the source said. Additional Reporting by Bill Sanderson STOP WHAT YOU'RE DOING The new TSA measures, some of which were supposed to be eased yesterday, include: * Increased gate screening, including pat-downs and bag searches for every passenger * No access to carry-ons during last hour of flights * No more covering laps with blankets and pillows * Passengers must remain in seats during last hour of flights * Airlines flying to US must turn off in-flight entertainment systems with embedded maps or GPS programs showing exact location * Pilots and crew will not make announcements identifying landmarks on ground * More canine teams and law- enforcement officers at gates * More "behavior detection" measures - as in passenger questioning - at security gates

Originally published by CAROLYN SALAZAR, BETH STEBNER, AMBER SUTHERLAND, and TOM NAMAKO.

(c) 2009 The New York Post. Provided by ProQuest LLC. All rights Reserved.

A service of YellowBrix, Inc.

 

[Severine]

Blech. Makes me never want to fly with my kids. What a disaster that would be with no potty in the last hour and no personal items to occupy them for that hour either. Then everybody would be complaining on the plane because of the little terrors howling because they peed their pants and have nothing to do. Yup. no desire to fly anywhere with them any time soon...

 

[Slidergirl]

Blech. Makes me never want to fly with my kids. What a disaster that would be with no potty in the last hour and no personal items to occupy them for that hour either. Then everybody would be complaining on the plane because of the little terrors howling because they peed their pants and have nothing to do. Yup. no desire to fly anywhere with them any time soon...

How would you like to be the next people to sit in the seats your little terrors just sat (and peed in their pants) in??? Turnaround time is at a premium for airlines. Imagine what will happen when they have to attempt to clean up the little surprises left by little *and big* terrors???
After taking a transatlantic flight where you sleep for hours, it's not going to be a pretty sight when an entire coach section queues up for those 2 toilets before the 1 hour time limit kicks in!!! I'm glad my next flights to/from Europe are in Business class - at least I'll only have to contend with30+ others instead of 130+ for 2 toilets

 

[abc]

My prediction is the opposit of MSL:

1) the one hr rule will be abandoned (or relaxed back to the last 10-15 min as is currently) very soon.

2) the nothing on lap will be abandoned, period. (it maybe replaced with "hands visible" -- like in overnight flight, seatbelts must be visible outside the blanket)

3) There WILL BE more pat downs for the near term. And longer wait at security check point, at least for a while.

There will be further reduced air travel, especially short haul flights. The time it takes to go through airport security and delays will simply push more travellers to drive (or business travellers to telecomference) instead. One or two more airlines going under (or merged) in a year as a result! Though by then, we would have forgotten what cause the travellers NOT travel in the first place.

 

[itri]

Ok, live, first-person report here. I just got home from flying Ft Wayne to Denver, via Cincinnati. Absolutely NOTHING unusual or different from previous security measures. No long lines, no extra searches, no pat-downs, no seated for last hour of flight rule, no restrictions on lap items. Period. Not even any extra loitering TSA people anywhere that I could see, in any of the three airports. Total time to get through security? About 2 minutes. And that was with waiting for the grandmother in front of me to putter around with her shoes and carry-on.

If you're flying domestically, I wouldn't even give it a second thought. Internationally, obviously, is still another story (at least for the moment), but that also seems to be directed primarily on inbound flights, not outbound, and I really don't see it lasting very long.

 

[Slidergirl]

I think it depends on which airport you are flying out of and where you are going to. For instance, if you're flying out of an airport like JFK, LAX, MSP, etc., it could be an extra nightmare over what it usually is. The purely domestic airports shouldn't be affected, since the new "regulations" are supposedly only for international flight into the US. But, "mission creep" does happen, and we will find the occasional TSA agent, gate agent, flight attendant trying to enforce a rule where it shouldn't exist. Most of the extra measures are after you go through the checkpoint. Extra patdown and handcheck of carryons will happen at your gate before you board. The rest are all on the plane.
My best friend had to take her mother down to LAX yesterday for a flight to Hawaii. She was flying Delta. It took her a full 2.5 hours to get through checkin, baggage handoff to TSA, and TSA security. Normally, it takes about 30 minutes there. Now, some was international traffic, some was domestic traffic, and some was holiday traffic. Hopefully, the people at the airport at Honolulu and those people working the flights to the Mainland have been fully briefed that flying back to the Mainland is NOT an international flight!!!

 

[MaineSkiLady]

2-200K frequent flyers interviewed this a.m. on "Good Morning America." One had just returned from vacation @ Vail, said carry-on boot bags are a TSA nightmare, as they must be fully inspected, including some contents removed. He had ALL ski equipment, including boots (), go FedEx, both ways.

 

[pinto]

2-200K frequent flyers interviewed this a.m. on "Good Morning America." One had just returned from vacation @ Vail, said carry-on boot bags are a TSA nightmare, as they must be fully inspected, including some contents removed. He had ALL ski equipment, including boots (), go FedEx, both ways.

We are flying to Utah next week ... lately I haven't carried boots in a bag, just attached with the straps and taken a small carry-on (just big enough for laptop). Sounds like this is still the best way to go? I'm confused now.

 

[Sheena]

My parents just left yesterday. They said there were no extra restrictions in the security gate, however, there were TSA employees at the gate taking samples of some of the liquids people were bringing on. Also, hey could not get up for the last hour flying into DC.

 

[pinto]

I don't understand the getting-up-during-last-hour thing. If you're going to blow up a plane, wouldn't you then do it just in the last hour and 10 minutes, instead?

 

[itri]

Precisely. This is why the restrictions are dumb.

 

[Kiragirl]

I flew home into Westchester (NY) from West palm Beach on Sunday the 27th and it was a breeze. Other than not being able to confirm times pre-flight phone or internet, I practically cruised right thru the security area, there seemed to be very few passengers around. One security guy asked me if I had any liquids in my carryon (small) bag; I said one small container of saline solution; he says ok go on ahead, that was it. No other questions or other behavior. strange. (of course it is a domestic flight, not overseas)

 

[vanhoskier]

My experiences with flights originating in Florida is that their security is more relaxed than other places. I flew out of Allentown with 2 bicycles in a bike box and wheelcases....got fully inspected and torn apart as I was pulled aside in security. However, flying out of Miami with the same gear....no one even questioned it or inspected the contents. Weird.

I really think the security measures will depend on the airport. It will be interesting to hear of others' experiences.

 

[little one]

definitely depends on the airport. my daughter just flew out of montreal to newark with skis, boot bag and large duffel. took her an hour to get through customs. usually only takes minutes.

 

[Marigee]

I am sitting at my gate at Reagan National Airport (outside D.C.) and when #1 son and I went through security he was pulled aside and his boot bag was emptied completely. They then sent his boots through separately and checked the bag again as well. My boot bag went through just fine. I was then told that the hand/foot wamers in his bag triggered the scrutiny and we could not take them unless we checked the boot bag. We opted to throw them out. Before we did they came back to us and said only certain kinds of hand/foot warmers were verbotten. If the warmers say "not to be used in an oxygen rich environment"' then they can't be taken in carry on luggage. Ours didn't say that so we were the allowed to take them with us. The entire time in the security line was about 1/2 hour. We got to the airport about 1 1nd 1/2 hours before our flight (already had boarding passes and had paid for checked bags) so we were fine. Reagan actually has pretty quick security lines as a rule, well-ordered and efficient. I think the screeners actually worked well with us and I wasn't annoyed. I'm glad I was prepared ahead of time for the possibility of my boot bag being checked.

 

[vanhoskier]

Saw this on You Tube this morning:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5YGc4zOqozo

 

[Slidergirl]

Cute video. Got me thinking...
When I still lived in Los Angeles, a group of friends took a ski trip to Vail. We took, ta da, United Airlines to Denver. It was a good trip. Back on the plane home, waiting for departure, I noticed a luggage cart filled with skis sitting near the plane. I wasn't particularly worried - surely the baggage folks wouldn't forget an entire luggage cart of items. Fast forward to baggage claim in Los Angeles. Sure enough, no one from the flight received their skis!!! There easily had to be 50 people waiting for skis. Fortunately, United was not so bad to us. They said "oops", and promised to deliver our skis to our home as soon as they got them flown back from Denver.

 

[CMCM]

Sorry, but I think a lot of the security is ridiculous. A certain amount of profiling needs to go on. 80 year old grandmas aren't likely suspects, I'm afraid. Let's see, there was the shoe bomber so now EVERYONE must remove shoes. This latest guy was the underwear bomber...does that mean we'll now have to remove shoes AND underwear to go thru security???

Also...their reactions about remaining in seats the last hour of the flight...silly. So now they will stage something in the first hour, or in the middle.