A new low being examined by the TSA. It’s now policy that drinks are no longer permitted to pass through security. Passengers then purchase drinks within the sterile area, yet the TSA believes they need to sample your liquid. “The TSA wouldn’t say what they’re testing for or why they are doing it, but travelers say they have a right to know” the story reads.
It’s another case of our Fourth Amendment Rights being violated by the TSA. Their position, “TSA employees have many layers of security throughout airports. Passengers may be randomly selected for additional screening measures at the checkpoint or in the gate at any time.” It’s bad enough now seeing the TSA harass and assault passengers inside the sterile area. What else will the traveling public be submitting to in the future to make sure air travel is safe?
Some interesting words from Kip Hawley, former Administrator for the Transportation Security Administration and author of Permanent Emergency over on FDL Book Salon:
Bruce S: Kip, your book has the first coherent explanation of the liquid ban I have ever read. For the benefit of those who have not read the book, can you explain 1) which liquid explosive you were concerned about, 2) why you were unwilling to allow a 12-oz. bottle of liquid through airport security but were willing to allow four 3-oz. bottles plus an empty 12-oz. bottle, and 3) what was the security reason for the baggie?
Kip: 1) highly concentrated liquid hydrogen peroxide with a sugar fuel and some other things. An extremely powerful explosive.
2) Our labs found that the mixture was extremely finicky and that mixing it was not simple. Our professional chemists in labs had difficulty making the bomb and found mixing to be problematic. AQ valued bomb-makers and were not sending them out on suicide missions. The times they asked operatives to do minimal bomb-making (Richard Reid & Abdulmutallab), they botched it. It was risk management in the end. A possibility but remote in my opinion.
3) the baggie allowed the liquids to be gathered so officers would’nt have to hunt for them and the vapor lock captured hydrogen peroxide vapor for easy testing.
This discussion board user at TravelUnderground.org sums it up nicely, “They have a procedure that is first and foremost ridiculous on its face, based on an implausible theory, carried out by idiots who don’t even know what they’re doing, managed by morons who either don’t understand the directive or don’t know what’s going on under their own noses, to mitigate a threat that isn’t even feasible.”
I fly once a year and have been since leaving the airlines. I still have no desire to use ANY airline and go through the dog and pony show at the security checkpoints. Thankfully I have never been asked to submit to a molestation and hopefully that trend will continue in August when I must fly to Las Vegas.