Positive TSA experience

[abqtj]

I know it's easy to bag on the TSA, but I had a great encounter this past week.

Flying to DAL Monday for work meetings. That AM I go through my backpack to make sure nothing that isn't supposed to be there is in it.

Get to the airport, check in at ticket counter, then to security. Head through the body X-ray and on the other side my backpack isn't there. Um what?

I ask an agent and he gets word from another that my backpack needs secondary screening. OK, no biggie. Pulls me aside and does the whole drill, can't touch bag while he's searching etc.

Instantly pulls out my Leatherman! CRAP! I missed it buried in a pocket.

Gets serious and explains big fines, have to leave it behind, etc. I apologize, tell him I know better and even checked my bag but must have missed it.

Then, he asks me how long until my flight. I still had about 75 minutes, so he said he would walk me and my backpack out so I could go back to the ticket counter and put the Leatherman in my luggage to check it through.

WHAT A SAINT!

Rush to the ticket counter, get up there and explain what's going on. Of course she said they aren't supposed to get our bags back for us, but I could check my backpack. Ugh,...I guess so. But them she changes her tune. She said "Weren't you just here to check in?" yup, like 7 minutes ago. So she said again, not supposed to but she'll see if my bag is still back there.

it was, let me put the Leatherman in it, and all was right in the world


So kudos to the TSA agent and to the SWA ticket counter agent for helping me out when they really didn't have to. 100% my fault, but there's some good people in the world.



tl;dr

Dummy left a Leatherman in his backpack, TSA let him put it in his luggage instead of tossing it in the trash.

 

[PeterNSteinmetz]

This post is a good example of Stockholm Syndrome, grateful that someone acted human and applied common sense, which has become rare, whereas in our pre-Stockhom days we expected it. Now we are pathetically grateful when they throw us a bone. Hope this is not taken as a snub or attack, but ask yourself, when did we start being grateful when these people treated us as humans?

Exactly - Stockholm Syndrome. There is no credible evidence that the TSA has or will stop terrorist attacks yet costs nearly $8 billion per year all the while engaged in arguably illegal searches and seizures.

 

[PeterNSteinmetz]

I don't think we know whether the TSA has stopped any terrorists, because there doesn't seem to be any way of knowing how many terrorists have been deterred from making the attempt.

One can look at the rates of such attacks before and after formation of the TSA. These are very rare events, but based on that data, no evidence of a change in rate due to the TSA.

One can also examine how easy it is to imagine ways to defeat the TSA screening. It is easy and there are many, so again, no reason to think the TSA procedures work.

 

[PeterNSteinmetz]

Sure, there have been 4 incidents where non-crew members destroyed a plane in flight departing from a US airport since 1961. They were in 1961, 1962, 1987 and 2001. So if you work out the rate of such attacks before the TSA (including the 2001 attacks), that is 4 per 40 years, or about 1 per 10 years.

Given that frequency, it is not that improbable that 16 years might elapse without such an attack. (One can work that out more precisely of course, but I think one can see that it is not that unlikely for 1.6 10 year periods to go by without an attack when one only expects 1 per 10 year period).

Thus the argument that the TSA works since there have been no attacks since 2001 is, statistically speaking, invalid.

Given the lack of good evidence that the TSA works, and plenty of other evidence to suggest their procedures are not effective, spending $8.1 billion per year on this "security theatre" seems a very severe mis-allocation of resources. If one wants to spend that kind of money on saving lives, there are likely 100X more effective ways to spend it.

 

[PeterNSteinmetz]

Can you work that out with mere hijackings?

A good question. I’ve been meaning to go through and classify incidents along these lines and compare with total passenger miles. However, given other issues presently, I would anticipate at least 6 months before I could do that.

 

[PeterNSteinmetz]

I don't see any correlation. The world today is much different than 1961.

Certainly a lot of changes, but if true, then the argument that we should somehow compare the rate of attacks before and after the implementation of the TSA to conclude that the TSA has prevented attacks is even less valid.

I believe we may have discussed this before, so let me ask, other than the lack of attacks since 2001, is there any other actual evidence that the TSA prevents terrorist attacks which is convincing, in your view?

 

[PeterNSteinmetz]

My statement was that we don't know whether the TSA has stopped any terrorists. I don't think that your method of comparing the number of attacks before and after TSA's inception is sufficient to tell us, because there are too many variables that are unaccounted for.

That is however the only data we have for comparing rates. Technically, what a failure to detect a significant difference means is that the data do not suggest there is a difference.

Remember, the burden of proof is on he who asserts existence of something (otherwise one is stuck trying to prove the non-existence of something). I agree that was not your statement.

However, if others wish to assert that the TSA has changed the rate of attack, there is no data which suggests that is true. And the assertion that zero attacks since 2001 proves the TSA works is just such an assertion of the existence of an effect and is statistically demonstrably mistaken.

As noted above, there are lots of other reasons to think the TSA don't work -- failure to detect contraband, the ease with which one can imagine work arounds, the lack of any demonstrated successes, etc.

Thus from a public policy point of view, as noted by @SoonerAviator, is it really worth $8.1 billion a year, the loss of everyone's time, and massive invasion of privacy?

 

[PeterNSteinmetz]

2) would you get on a commercial airliner with ZERO security?? I mean zero. Walk from your parking space, kick the tires, climb the jet bridge and board five hours early.

As in many things, and I believe we have discussed before, I suspect the best real solution is to let the airlines decide in a market driven process what the appropriate trade-off is between security and convenience (see http://realairlinesecurity.org).

And yes, I would probably be willing to board such an aircraft if myself and other passengers could be armed and they had the same policies as now about hardened cockpit doors and not giving up control of the plane.

I don’t think there are that many people that want to blow them up in the US because there haven’t been any attacks on the lines leading to TSA security, which would make a very soft bomb target.

 

[PeterNSteinmetz]

No doubt.

What makes you so certain this is a highly likely event?

If they are that motivated, why haven’t they bombed some TSA lines? As many or more people as in a typical flight, no screening beforehand, has worked in other countries.

If we are just swimming in terrorists that want to attack us, why haven’t they executed that attack? Why isn’t it happening with some frequency actually?

It certainly can’t be TSA screening before the TSA screening line. There must some other factors, perhaps good policing or simply the good life people enjoy here that demotivates that type of attack. If policing works, great, let’s spend some of the $8.1 billion on that and less on security theatre.