Ask the pilot

From shoulder-fired missiles to cargo bombs, passengers face a cavalcade of deadly possibilities. But at least the TSA is listening ... sort of.

By Patrick Smith

Read more: Technology & Business, Business, P. Smith, Ask the Pilot, Shoulder Launched Missiles

Sept. 29, 2006 | "Common sense." That was the term used by Transportation Security Administration director Edmund "Kip" Hawley, in an overdue press conference on Monday. The big news: Airport carry-on restrictions would at last be eased.

Passengers are now permitted to carry small toiletry products beyond the security checkpoint, including hand lotion, deodorant and toothpaste. These items are limited to 3 ounces each and must be screened separately in a clear 1-quart zipper-top plastic bag. Bags are being provided. Additionally, passengers may once again bring beverages and other liquids aboard flights, provided those items are purchased in restaurants or shops beyond the security checkpoint.

Never mind for a minute that many of the employees who work within an airport's secure zone, including those who clean and service your plane, are themselves fully exempt from screening -- something highlighted in this space many months ago. And never mind that the entire liquid bomb scare was, to a large degree, a trumped-up ruse -- something the mainstream media lacks the fortitude to tackle. Instead, let's give partial credit where it's due. "Common sense" is a subjective thing, and calling out TSA for every hypocritical and silly decision is to employ the same pointless micromanaging the agency itself is so fond of. A bureaucracy this dimwitted and lumbering needs to be treated exactly the way it treats us: like a child.

"We now know enough to say that a total ban is no longer needed from a security point of view," Hawley said at the press conference.

Way to go, Kipper. Americans are proud of your progress. We're behind you all the way. And from TSA's perspective, this baby-steps approach allows it to save face. After all, security is politics, and think of how foolish the agency would look if it admitted the whole liquids and gels proscription was a bunch of ineffective hogwash from the beginning.

In the meantime, others are finally piping up. After nearly two months, we're starting to hear grumblings of dissent from airlines and their workers. Most notable among the comments are those from the Air Line Pilots Association, the world's most prominent flight crew union, representing pilots at four of the top five carriers. Nobody would accuse pilots of being soft on security, and it's nice to hear ALPA (of which, in full disclosure, I'm a member) speaking forcibly and sensibly. "Today's TSA action once again underscores the agency's focus on searching for objects," said a statement from president Duane Woerth on the day the changes were announced. "We must move past this limited view of airline security and adapt new methods to keep the system secure. ALPA urges the TSA to do more to create a security screening system that effectively finds those travelers intent on doing harm, rather than the current system that seeks to remove objects that travelers frequently carry."

A bit clunky (usually he's better), but Woerth has it right. Remarks from other sources have been somewhat muted. Although at least three U.S. airlines have admitted that luggage policies were beginning to drive away customers, the president of the Air Transport Association, the industry's largest and most powerful trade group, offered this well-padded response to news of the security revisions: "It is clear that TSA has performed deliberate and careful risk analysis to identify which items passengers can safely bring on board. It will reduce passenger inconvenience."

The last part is a given. The first part raises some eyebrows. If it were true, then according to expert testimony on the realities of liquid explosives, the bans would never have been enacted in the first place.

The new revisions are set to last indefinitely, though it's possible further relaxations will be put in place later. The separate bagging requirement, together with the need to remove laptops, shoes and heavy winter coats, is liable to have dire consequences for security-line waiting times come Thanksgiving and Christmas.

Until then, the changes are only somewhat good news for passengers, but excellent news for airport merchants, who can get back to the job of fleecing us with overpriced water and $4 bottles of juice. (Gratefully, air travel's signature take-along snack, the Chick-fil-A sandwich, was never subject to the TSA's wrath, and remains ever delectable, semi-noncombustible and meatlike.) The government has insisted that in-terminal vendors weren't suffering from the all-out liquids and gels ban. Allegedly, because passengers were setting out earlier than usual to the airport, they were spending more money on drinks, food and souvenirs once they got there. I'm not sure I believe that.

"Obviously, in certain product categories, concessions were definitely taking a hit," says a spokesman for Massport, operator of Boston's Logan International Airport, the nation's 18th busiest. "Water is the No. 1 product sold in terminals."

And some concourse shops, such as the wine sellers popular at airports in South America, and duty-free stores hawking liquor and perfume, specialize solely in the types of products that, until this week, had been prohibited. Was there an organized effort to change things?

"Not that I'm aware of," says the Massport source. "Certain merchants suffered more than others, but their losses were manageable."

Canadian and European airports are expected to align their policies with the amended U.S. rules. (No word yet if authorities in Argentina have similarly seen the light, backing off from their crazy prohibitions of empty cans of shaving cream and blunt-tipped scissors.)

So, if nothing else, and if not necessarily for the best reasons, TSA is moving in the right direction. But before pouring 3 ounces of champagne into a baggie and heading to the airport for a toast, I wonder if we're not beyond the point of redemption, now that our security apparatus has fallen into full dystopian comedy. At this point, if Kip Hawley and the TSA didn't already exist, somebody would have to make them up, simply for their value as entertainment. I was not present at Hawley's press conference on Monday morning, but one imagines a certain comic tension in the air as he stood at the lectern, talking to reporters about zipper bags and beverages and lip balm. My question would have been this one:

"Excuse me, Director Hawley, regarding that 3-ounce limitation: What if a person has a 4-ounce container, but only 3 ounces of liquid inside?" Maybe that's the TSA's problem. It needs to laugh more.

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