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Sunday, December 27, 2009

Reality has been completely inverted
Posted by Jill | 12:13 PM
I'll let Charles Johnson explain.

The idea that before it's all over I may have to blogroll Little Green Footballs is just mind-boggling.

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2 Comments:
Blogger Serr8d said...
Oh, Charles Johnson will come back-stabbing at you soon enough. He's (temporarily?) lost his faculties.

Happens when you're home alone on the internets for too long.

You know?
12/27/09, 3:42 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...
Let's be really, really serious here: NO TECHNOLOGY SOLUTION is going to prevent the determined suicide bomber from carrying a bomb aboard an airplane.. Period!
The Israeli solution is NOT technological. The US has this fascination with technology that is going to get somebody killed. [Full body scan and deep body cavity X-ray might do it, but I suspect someone will make an explosive that looks to x-ray like sh*t, stuff it in the lower intestine, and ... No body is going to look!]

However, I would point out that modern airliners are extremely rugged devices. They are not likely to be brought down catastrophically by firecrackers -- but 3 ounces [the limit per container today] could do real damage, especially if you mixed several 3 ounce containers of whatever "cosmetics" you were carrying.

The bomb that brought down PanAm over Scotland was in checked luggage, and was believed to be a 1/2 pound or so of military explosive. Other airliners have suffered serious on-board explosions, some have lost doors and other parts, and they have survived. TWA-800 [off Long Island] was brought down when a fuel tank exploded.

I expect that soon -- if not already -- someone will manufacture explosive fabric made into clothing. [It can already be made to look like a wallet -- or the contents.] Setting that off could make a pretty good bang. Certainly start a fire. However, without some method of directing the explosion outward, I suspect the airplane would survive, although I also expect there would be deaths and serious injury and depending on exactly where over the world's oceans the event occurred, could result in a plane so crippled that it couldn't make land..

Would I want to be on such a flight? No! Of course not. Do I fret over it? No! Again. The drive to the airport is still much more dangerous than the flight itself. And weather -- and pilot inattention!? -- still brings down more flights than terrorism. And if you travel much, like I do, you can't help but notice how utterly "casual" the checkpoints become. Especially during busy times. Don't want to inconvenience the flying public. Wouldn't want to insult some rich business man. Don't want to miss my break. The current "pat down" searches will end soon. Despite the jokes, we won't be flying naked -- or nearly so.

I'll believe the TSA knows what they're doing when they actually stop someone AT THE CHECKPOINT with bomb material. Not some idiot with a Swiss Army knife. They claim to have done it, but won't release details. The "terrorist" interceptions they've done so far have all been well away from airports, and not by the TSA.

[I would direct anyone who's interested to watch the archive videos from Discovery Channel MythBusters where they demonstrate how difficult it is to damage an airliner.]
12/27/09, 3:59 PM  
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