Hard Light Productions Forums
Off-Topic Discussion => General Discussion => Topic started by: The E on April 26, 2012, 07:41:20 am
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Don't you feel safer knowing that America is protected by vigilant security professionals at all times who make sure that the dangerous individuals known as 4-year-old girls (http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5iqXq5uIQG3PmYwliFdyJ2OsPjteA?docId=b726846c32164eafa77a4cdeddf2dfcd) or disabled 7-year-olds (http://www.thedaily.com/page/2012/04/25/042512-news-tsa-complaint-1-3/) are only allowed to board a plane after a thorough body search?
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Modern airport security: inconveniencing people to give the illusion of security.
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Modern airport security: inconveniencing people to give the illusion of security.
Has this not been the cases since they put in metal detectors?
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It's a deterrent, like having enough nukes to destroy the world 100 times over. You only need to destroy the world once (Although destroying it another few times is good for fun), but you keep building those nukes because nukes are SCAARY
Same with airport security... But those waiting ques do make some interesting targets. Why target single flights? If you can cause rampage on an airfield, you can have a much bigger effect with much less means.
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Modern airport security: inconveniencing people to give the illusion of security.
Has this not been the cases since they put in metal detectors?
Yes, but the security/inconvenience ratio has gotten much worse since then.
Also, this is a topic I can rage about all day, but I shall forbear. I'll just say that disbanding the TSA is a fantastic way to get my vote.
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The fundamental problem with airport security (which has been amply demonstrated by people like Bruce Schneier) is that it is completely reactive in nature. Bad guys use knifes to take pilots hostage? Ban knifes, reinforce doors. Bad people use shoes to smuggle explosives? Make people take their shoes of. Since all these measures are known and visible, it takes a rather dumb terrorist to get caught by these things.
In essence, all of this bullsit just ensures that the next attack (if indeed there is a next attack) will use a vector that isn't covered.
Just as it is more or less impossible to stop someone determined to commit suicide, it is impossible to stop a well-planned and executed terror strike; your best hope is to head off the attack before it leaves the planning stage. Which means human intelligence, not some minimum wage goon paid to grope people before boarding a plane.
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The fundamental problem with airport security (which has been amply demonstrated by people like Bruce Schneier) is that it is completely reactive in nature. Bad guys use knifes to take pilots hostage? Ban knifes, reinforce doors. Bad people use shoes to smuggle explosives? Make people take their shoes of. Since all these measures are known and visible, it takes a rather dumb terrorist to get caught by these things.
In essence, all of this bullsit just ensures that the next attack (if indeed there is a next attack) will use a vector that isn't covered.
Just as it is more or less impossible to stop someone determined to commit suicide, it is impossible to stop a well-planned and executed terror strike; your best hope is to head off the attack before it leaves the planning stage. Which means human intelligence, not some minimum wage goon paid to grope people before boarding a plane.
If I'm not mistaken the Israelis are supposed to have an excellent system based on hiring and training intelligent personnel. Essentially they go through the lines asking simple questions and depending on the reactions are able to escalate as necessary.
(http://terminallance.com/comics/2010-12-17-Strip_89_TSA_web.gif)
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I like the part where young attractive women are more likely to randomly selected for full-body scans and wanding and stuff.
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If I'm not mistaken the Israelis are supposed to have an excellent system based on hiring and training intelligent personnel. Essentially they go through the lines asking simple questions and depending on the reactions are able to escalate as necessary.
Except for that case where a group of a family of Dutch girls along with their boyfriends were held up for hours because the Isreali's had problems with the slightly tanned dutchman of North-African decent, who was investigated for hours, even though the man was Dutch in any way a man can be Dutch (Account of one of the people I study with).
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I'm very inclined to doubt that, considering how brown most of the region's population happens to be. Israelis included.
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I just some times wish I could tell in public of some of the things what has happened to me with the airport security. Too bad I can't, I don't want to give anyone any silly ideas.
But basically, the one who said it is reactionary is correct.
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This only shows how successful terrorist are. Because of them, people are paranoid, scared and afraid of another bombing. Getting around the world is annoying due to security measures, and trust in government decreased. In short, the terrorists are winning the "War on Terror", and it doesn't seem like it's going to change soon.
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this is why i started taking boats. and you still have to show your ids to the ****ing smurffs.
at least they dont touch you, or scan you, or look through your stuff, or confiscate your knives and firearms (though you are expected to leave them in the cargo hold).
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A lot has been said against the TSA. According to TIME magazine, they have yet to catch a single terrorist, and spend on average 2 million taxpayer dollars per gun they actually manage to confiscate. It has repeatedly been demonstrated how a terrorist could easily slip something past the TSA if they really wanted to. And the establishment of the TSA was unnecessary in the first place because airports were using private contractors for security before they came along.
Even worse, by allowing the government to curtail freedoms in exchange for security, we are letting the so-called 'terrorists' win. By definition a terrorist's goal is to spread fear and terror, and by that definition they seem to be succeeding.
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i got my dope past the tsa, just dont ask how.
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I was flying home from Florida a couple of months ago with my brother. At the airport, we each got in two different screening lines to get past the checkpoint.
Neither of us noticed it at the time, it was only after I got past the checkpoint that I noticed that I had happened to choose the "metal detector/oh-he's-probably-safe" line, where my brother had accidentally picked the "backscatter/wand/pat-down" line.
It seemed kind of funny that an actually determined smuggler could just pick the right line and slip on through.
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i got my dope past the tsa, just dont ask how.
Not hard, airport security ion scanners are calibrated for explosives, not drugs. Customs on the other hand...
I worked in an airport (for the CBSA (http://"http://www.cbsa-asfc.gc.ca/"), before I switched departments) for a little over a year, and dealt with the morons in airport security virtually daily. It's a joke - an absolute, complete, farcical mess. I had a hilarious moment a few days ago flying for work. One of the screeners pulled me aside to run the ion scan on my hands (for explosives) and asked me if I'd ever had it done before. I patiently explained to him that I used to run the machine for another federal agency. The look on his face was pretty entertaining.
Just like how they harass pilots over mother****ing nail clippers, yet the pilot can access a goddamned fire axe in the cockpit. Ridiculous.
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Seriously, pilots should be allowed to have whatever they want with them, within reason. For the flight, they are master and commander of the craft and its passengers, to the point where they can point at someone and say "they aren't boarding my plane", and that's the law. So, unless it's explosives, (except for ammo for a sidearm, if they carry), drugs, or other such obviously improper material, I don't see why the pilot can't take whatever he wants on board the craft that he is ultimately responsible for.
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i remember when they used to put those fire axes in certain places in the cabin, in the overhead bins near the flight attendant stations. if there was a fire onboard the plane i doubt you could get to a fire axe in a timely fashion. im just waiting for all this extra security to actually kill people.
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Seriously, pilots should be allowed to have whatever they want with them, within reason. For the flight, they are master and commander of the craft and its passengers, to the point where they can point at someone and say "they aren't boarding my plane", and that's the law. So, unless it's explosives, (except for ammo for a sidearm, if they carry), drugs, or other such obviously improper material, I don't see why the pilot can't take whatever he wants on board the craft that he is ultimately responsible for.
Maybe they are afraid that the pilot will go crazy during a flight and do something funny with what they brought with them.
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Seriously, pilots should be allowed to have whatever they want with them, within reason. For the flight, they are master and commander of the craft and its passengers, to the point where they can point at someone and say "they aren't boarding my plane", and that's the law. So, unless it's explosives, (except for ammo for a sidearm, if they carry), drugs, or other such obviously improper material, I don't see why the pilot can't take whatever he wants on board the craft that he is ultimately responsible for.
Maybe they are afraid that the pilot will go crazy during a flight and do something funny with what they brought with them.
As opposed to, say, pushing forward for a few seconds? :P
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Just like how they harass pilots over mother****ing nail clippers, yet the pilot can access a goddamned fire axe in the cockpit. Ridiculous.
Those nail clippers are much more dangerous.... than machine guns: http://boingboing.net/2010/11/19/tsa-confiscates-heav.html
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I do imagine the caliber of person allowed to pilot aircraft are a little less susceptible to random acts of craziness.
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I do imagine the caliber of person allowed to pilot aircraft are a little less susceptible to random acts of craziness.
according to our friend swartz it's a pretty **** job and liable to drive anyone to craziness
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Hmm. Point.
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Actually, over in America, we've had some problems with the flight crew spontaneously "losing it".
There was this incident recently: http://travel.usatoday.com/flights/story/2012-03-27/JetBlue-captain-subdued-after-erratic-behavior-on-flight/53811070/1
And another involving a flight attendant: http://abcnews.go.com/Travel/flight-attendant-rant-sends-american-airlines-flight-back/story?id=15886557
While I do think the TSA is security theater and goes overboard with confiscating pretty much everything, I don't think arming the flight crew is a good idea.
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im still waiting for a bunch of terrorists with blackbelts in some martial art try to take over a plane. i guess the tsa will need to learn to do amputations for anyone who wants to fly.
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I really hate the circus that goes on at airports as TSA tries to convince everyone they're protecting us by taking away nail clippers. I'm going to be flying cross-country out to Florida at the end of May, too. :banghead: Fortunately the airport I'm flying out of is only John Wayne so security isn't nearly as paranoid as at LAX.
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There's really no point to the TSA, because the terrorists won the war a long time ago. Or at least America destroyed itself, so by default the terrorists won.
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There's really no point to the TSA, because the terrorists won the war a long time ago. Or at least America destroyed itself, so by default the terrorists won.
I think the real point is to assuage the public's fear of terrorism. Even though airport securities methods are akin to a "security" blanket, it eases the psyche of the public so that they are not constantly in fear. Remember the definition of terror?
It's not the acts themselves that cause the most fear, its the mere thought of it happening at any moment, at any place, to anyone. :snipe:
(Wondering if I should've taken up a psychology/sociology minor...)
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I really don't give a **** about the TSA. The only inconvenience I've encountered with them is a long line. I needed something to do for my 4 hour layover anyway. Is it REALLY that hard to just put your nail clippers in a checked bag? Or bring ones without a file on them?
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Is it REALLY that hard to just put your nail clippers in a checked bag? Or bring ones without a file on them?
Considering they won't let you wear your Medal of Honor on the plane, yes, it really is that hard. That's actually happened.
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I think the real point is to assuage the public's fear of terrorism. Even though airport securities methods are akin to a "security" blanket, it eases the psyche of the public so that they are not constantly in fear. Remember the definition of terror?
It's not the acts themselves that cause the most fear, its the mere thought of it happening at any moment, at any place, to anyone. :snipe:
(Wondering if I should've taken up a psychology/sociology minor...)
I don't think it is the public that fears terrorism so much anymore. There are a lot of people nowadays that don't trust our own government. Just look at the stock values of gun manufacturing companies - people aren't arming themselves just so they can hunt.
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Is it REALLY that hard to just put your nail clippers in a checked bag? Or bring ones without a file on them?
Considering they won't let you wear your Medal of Honor on the plane, yes, it really is that hard. That's actually happened.
OK, this is ridiculous (not to mention a disgrace). This is a medal that will:
a). Make every member of the armed forces salute you.
b). Show everyone that you could most likely take over the plane with bare hands if you wanted.
c). Show everyone that you're rather unlikely to do the above, for obvious reasons.
So, I guess this is the point where TSA went overboard. They should salute that guy, not try to confiscate his medal.
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i usually dont fly somewhere for fun, but because im moving from some outpost at the ass end of the world to another. i know i was once asked if i wanted throw away an entire suitcase, as if its contents was meaningless. the results were something like ":wtf" excuse me?" fortunately, the person who dropped me off offered to mail it to me once i got settled in at my dest, they owed me money anyway. moving entails throwing away a sizable portion of my stuff anyway. i cram what i have into the suitcases i have and throw the rest away anyway. and the fact that they would take away the rest of my hobo gear for the sake of security, kinda sickens me. i think in that case i had 2 small suitcases and a small duffel for a carry on. and i had to pay an extra $50 for those bags. i remember before 9/11. i used to be able to take a pair of 50 pound boxes and 2 large duffels as carry ons. i mean i could take a couple hundred pounds of stuff when i moved. now its like 75.
and thats just luggage, service used to be much better. they would feed you, and give you like 4 cokes throughout the flight. they hand out decks of cards and wings to noob fliers. nowadays you get a tiny bag of pretzels and a glass of orange juice. last time i was on a plane it was awfully a lot like being on a school bus. there were some unruly passengers who didnt want to follow the directions of the flight attendants. got out of their seats early. and they said they couldnt open the doors till everyone sat down. i mean we were already at the gate. they spent the next 5 minutes taking down to the people who got up like they were children. finally they opened the doors, and we were at my stop, i grabbed my single bag and proceeded to the door but not without having a claustrophobic smoker and 2 flight attendants having a heated debate about whether or not passengers should be allowed off the plane to smoke. this was the tiny local airport it was one room and no smoking area, and the plane was 20 minutes from juneau anyway.
i remember when flying used to be fun, and an effective way to move you and your stuff. nowadays they take all the fun out of it. tsa might make it a troublesome experience. but that is only a minor inconvenience when compared to the decline of airline service in general. from now on im gonna buy me a barely functional car, load it up with my crap and drive it onto the ferry. and i bet it would cost lest than taking your 2 bags on the plane. except you are moving all your stuff.
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Prices for extra luggage have become hilarious over the last years.
Been wondering if those price increases are actually "necessary" for security or whatever reasons or if that's just an excuse for price gauging people who happened to pack 2-3 pounds too much lol.
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The latter. Prices have nothing to do with security, except maybe with paying extra workers to check luggage (considering how computerized the process is, it can't be all that much). Aside from gouging regular passengers who happen to have a lot of luggage, they may also want to capitalize on the fact that if you want to take something sharp on board (like a small multitool or nail clippers), you have to put it into cargo hold.
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Or, since a not-insignificant number of US airline companies struggle to stay in the black as it is, they could be trying to make more money to keep operating.
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The latter. Prices have nothing to do with security, except maybe with paying extra workers to check luggage (considering how computerized the process is, it can't be all that much). Aside from gouging regular passengers who happen to have a lot of luggage, they may also want to capitalize on the fact that if you want to take something sharp on board (like a small multitool or nail clippers), you have to put it into cargo hold.
An overgeneralization at best...
Terrorism makes flight look unappealing to passengers, who choose other modes of transit. The ****ing TSA delays the movement of passengers and goods, which makes air travel look less appealing, and then puts a further strain on logistics. And the price of fuel rises as well... and baggage is heavy, which means there is more mass to move, thus requiring a greater fuel burn to get somewhere.
So, no. Everything is tied together. The airlines need to make a profit in the face of increasing challenges to their financial security, and increasing prices and slashing luxuries, or charging for previously free luxuries is the path needed to retain a profit. Strip searching old ladies and violating your personal dignity definately doesn't help the airlines give you better service.
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Well, OK. Your answer is less cynical, but more thought-out. Rising fuel prices obviously influence air travel prices (and we all know how bad these are), and TSA scaring people away from flying may have something to do with it as well (So yeah. Score one for the Terrorists).
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(http://www.yourfunnystuff.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/And-then-the-TSA-touch-their-balls%E2%80%A6.jpg)
http://gmancasefile.blogspot.com/2012/01/tsa-fail.html
Frankly, the professional experience I have had with TSA has frightened me. Once, when approaching screening for a flight on official FBI business, I showed my badge as I had done for decades in order to bypass screening. (You can be envious, but remember, I was one less person in line.) I was asked for my form which showed that I was armed. I was unarmed on this flight because my ultimate destination was a foreign country. I was told, "Then you have to be screened." This logic startled me, so I asked, "If I tell you I have a high-powered weapon, you will let me bypass screening, but if I tell you I'm unarmed, then I have to be screened?" The answer? "Yes. Exactly." Another time, I was bypassing screening (again on official FBI business) with my .40 caliber semi-automatic pistol, and a TSA officer noticed the clip of my pocket knife. "You can't bring a knife on board," he said. I looked at him incredulously and asked, "The semi-automatic pistol is okay, but you don't trust me with a knife?" His response was equal parts predictable and frightening, "But knives are not allowed on the planes."
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you know its probibly a bad idea to disarm the passengers, then they have noting on hand with which to fight the terrorists, that is when they do manage to come up with their next attack plan.
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We should
not send this video to Al Qaeda - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=olEoc_1ZkfA
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Hmmmm, and in the related videos we see Japan's take on the TSA (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yTq833b6Dxs&feature=related).
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Don't you feel safer knowing that America is protected by vigilant security professionals at all times who make sure that the dangerous individuals known as 4-year-old girls (http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5iqXq5uIQG3PmYwliFdyJ2OsPjteA?docId=b726846c32164eafa77a4cdeddf2dfcd) or disabled 7-year-olds (http://www.thedaily.com/page/2012/04/25/042512-news-tsa-complaint-1-3/) are only allowed to board a plane after a thorough body search?
Over protection causes more **** than its worth...
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you know its probibly a bad idea to disarm the passengers, then they have noting on hand with which to fight the terrorists, that is when they do manage to come up with their next attack plan.
There would have been a large chance 9/11 would have gone into history for being the largest attempted hijack ever, with over a dozen terrorists shot dead by passengers if they were allowed to carry on planes.
That said- There's plenty of other stuff that could be used as improvised weapons, and even more stuff that could easily be modded to be weapons.
(http://www.steves-digicams.com/news/DIY%20Sling.jpg)
(http://www.play.net/images/weapons/ball_and_chain.jpg)
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you guys do know that shooting guns on a plane that you are flying in is not very good for your health right?
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Indeed, without special training you're going to punch a hole in the hull and depressurize the entire plane, resulting in a crash. That's one regulation that makes perfect sense.
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Uh, actually, that one's been mythbusted. Shooting a hole in the plane does not result in explosive decompression.
Hell, planes have survived incidents in the air that left most of the upper fuselage missing and still landed without further incident.
So.... no, that's not why guns aren't allowed. Nor will special training allow you to magically not do damage to the plane.
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Let's also not forget that airports and airplanes have a bizarre way of turning otherwise normal, sensible people into drooling and/or belligerent idiots. A guy with a doctorate can step out of his car, pick up his luggage, look at an airport, and immediately forget everything he has learned since kindergarten. It's strange.
I worked in an airport, and I still fly frequently for work, and if there's one thing that I'm absolutely sure of it's that I do NOT want the general flying public to have access to anything that is designed to function as a weapon. Nevermind the drooling idiot factor - speaking as a person in law enforcement, the average member of the general public is useless in any type of high-stress conflict scenario. Worse, wannabes are a hindrance to those who actually know what they're doing.
There is a really simple way to keeping the peace on aircraft - one or two highly-trained, professional, and unarmed (except for perhaps a Taser) plain-clothes security/police personnel on each and every commercial flight. It'd be cheaper than bodyscanners in every airport, you could reduce screening to a person-based rather than luggage-based affair (Israel has got this **** right), and would be less hassle for everyone involved.
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Uh, actually, that one's been mythbusted. Shooting a hole in the plane does not result in explosive decompression.
Hell, planes have survived incidents in the air that left most of the upper fuselage missing and still landed without further incident.
So.... no, that's not why guns aren't allowed. Nor will special training allow you to magically not do damage to the plane.
I wasn't referring to "explosive decompression" (I know it was busted, and that it couldn't happen anyway). At high altitudes, sudden decompression could cause the crew to pass out from the lack of oxygen (though they do have masks to prevent that) and destabilize the plane. Of course, at lower altitudes, holes in the plane are less problematic, but airliners don't spend too much time flying low. Maybe I did a little overstatement by mentioning a crash, but the effects won't be good (nor cheap) and the plane won't be able to continue flight (it'd most likely land at the nearest airfield). And while special training wouldn't magically prevent you from damaging the plane, it'd reduce your chances of doing so to acceptable level.
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Decompression due to gunshots is incredibly slow. Slow enough that if you don't manage to get a mask on before anything actually happens means there either A) weren't enough masks, which unless your flight is severely overbooked isn't going to happen or B) whoever isn't wearing them probably has a good lesson to learn. The crew, in a decompression situation, is the first group of people on a flight to don masks.
Again, I direct you to the example of the plan that lost the entire forward upper fuselage at altitude and still made a safe landing. If something like that didn't cause a crash (and it is, quite seriously, the worst possible thing that could happen to an in-flight passenger aircraft short of losing an engine or spontaneously exploding), you severely underestimate the integrity of the aircraft.
Even if you hit a window with your shot, you're not even going to blow out the window, much less cause a sudden decompression. Thank you again Mythbusters. There are very few places you can actually shoot a plane from the inside to make it crash. The pilots, probably, if they didn't have the autopilot on like nearly all commercial flights do nowadays. Maybe throwing your gun into the engine would damage it enough to force a crash, although you're not going to get a good shot at doing that.
Aircraft are made of much sterner stuff than the media would have you believe.
EDIT: In case you think (http://www.theage.com.au/travel/travel-incidents/loose-rivets-found-in-us-plane-with-hole-in-fuselage-20110426-1duiq.html) I was making stuff up (http://www.foxnews.com/us/2011/04/02/fuselage-rupture-hole-ripped-planes-roof-force-emergency-landing/) about planes losing large bits of their fuselage (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aloha_Airlines_Flight_243) mid-flight and still landing safely (http://www.theage.com.au/travel/travel-incidents/jet-lands-safely-despite-ruptured-fuselage-20110402-1cs9y.html).
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There are several reasons why guns on a plane are a bad idea, structural damage to the plane itself being the smallest one.
The very biggest one is that an idiot with a gun can cause quite a stir among the hundreds of canned monkeys with him in the plane. Not to mention what a troll with a gun could do.
Yes, the argument that armed passengers can defend themselves exists, but I call bull**** on it. Without the sort of training that allows you to keep a cool head under fire, someone who "defends" himself with a gun will do as much or more damage than the attacker.
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Again, I direct you to the example of the plan that lost the entire forward upper fuselage at altitude and still made a safe landing. If something like that didn't cause a crash (and it is, quite seriously, the worst possible thing that could happen to an in-flight passenger aircraft short of losing an engine or spontaneously exploding), you severely underestimate the integrity of the aircraft.
As I said, I overstated a bit when I talked about a crash. It indeed does take a severe beating to cause an aircraft to crash. Also, a hit to hydraulics would most likely actually be worse than getting a part of the fuselage ripped off. Still, it'd disrupt the flight. A good pilot can land a plane that lost both engines and hydraulics, but he won't be landing at his destination.
I think that it's generally understood that guns shouldn't be given to idiots and trolls in first place, but even reasonable people have a tendency to panic and we can't count on every gun user being trained to fight in crowded conditions. Not to mention idiots get their hands on guns anyway (as Darwin Awards can attest).
In general, civilians carrying guns on a plane are a bad idea. Normal, trained and uniformed security personnel, on the other hand, would be a better one.
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Wait, wait, wait. Did somebody seriously advocate letting regular slubs carry firearms on an airplane? Seriously? Seriously?
Its easy plinking something with a rifle a football field away, CQB is entirely different beast and is immensely frigging difficult. I don't care how many hours you've logged playing Call of Dimwhits, close range shooting in reality requires a high degree of technical expertise. At close range a person only needs to sidestep to clear your sites. Some untrained jackoff with a pistol is going to shoot most of their fellow passengers before they actually put rounds into the intended target.
Thats exactly what we need some moon calf with an NRA logo tattooed on his forehead and wet dreams of being John McClane shooting up half the passenger roster and still missing the terrorist.
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Wait, wait, wait. Did somebody seriously advocate letting regular slubs carry firearms on an airplane? Seriously? Seriously?
Its easy plinking something with a rifle a football field away, CQB is entirely different beast and is immensely frigging difficult. I don't care how many hours you've logged playing Call of Dimwhits, close range shooting in reality requires a high degree of technical expertise. At close range a person only needs to sidestep to clear your sites. Some untrained jackoff with a pistol is going to shoot most of their fellow passengers before they actually put rounds into the intended target.
Thats exactly what we need some moon calf with an NRA logo tattooed on his forehead and wet dreams of being John McClane shooting up half the passenger roster and still missing the terrorist.
I drill extensively on close quarters battle. I can reliably pronounce all nine syllables of 'yippee ki yay, mother ****er' during my draw, although recently I have considered a more mild epithet, because there will probably be children and faithful persons on the plane. Suggestions please?
Normally I train with cardboard cutouts over which I have pasted printouts of terrorist faces. Recently it has become difficult to find high resolution images so I have started cutting clippings from my local newspaper and soaking them in coffee to brown them up. Ammunition is very expensive especially in this troubled economy so I am probably going to start a kickstarter
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Wait, wait, wait. Did somebody seriously advocate letting regular slubs carry firearms on an airplane? Seriously? Seriously?
Its easy plinking something with a rifle a football field away, CQB is entirely different beast and is immensely frigging difficult. I don't care how many hours you've logged playing Call of Dimwhits, close range shooting in reality requires a high degree of technical expertise. At close range a person only needs to sidestep to clear your sites. Some untrained jackoff with a pistol is going to shoot most of their fellow passengers before they actually put rounds into the intended target.
Thats exactly what we need some moon calf with an NRA logo tattooed on his forehead and wet dreams of being John McClane shooting up half the passenger roster and still missing the terrorist.
I drill extensively on close quarters battle. I can reliably pronounce all nine syllables of 'yippee ki yay, mother ****er' during my draw, although recently I have considered a more mild epithet, because there will probably be children and faithful persons on the plane. Suggestions please?
Maternal Philanderer?
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Wait, wait, wait. Did somebody seriously advocate letting regular slubs carry firearms on an airplane? Seriously? Seriously?
TBH, nobody did. Everybody said it's a bad idea, but we debated about why. :)
I know enough about CQC to know that an untrained person would most likely end up shooting up the plane, the passengers and getting killed by his target for all his trouble.
Arming the crew could be a good idea, but armed passengers could only cause trouble.
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I drill extensively on close quarters battle. I can reliably pronounce all nine syllables of 'yippee ki yay, mother ****er' during my draw, although recently I have considered a more mild epithet, because there will probably be children and faithful persons on the plane. Suggestions please?
Maternal Philanderer?
Looks like I'm gonna have to switch to the twist method
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Arming the crew is a better idea, how, exactly?
Unless you are willing to train these people to handle these weapons safely and responsibly at all times*, it's not that much better.
*Note: I consider the very presence of easily reachable firearms inside a plane to be a very very bad idea.
Reason being that, in the sort of situation that would call for its use, noone can be relied upon to do the Right Thing, unless the personnel responsible is going through the sort of training regimen that Secret Service personnel go through day by day.
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Yeah, I'm not sure what the training regimen Air Marshalls supposedly have but the only person I'd want armed is someone who is a veteran of some type of SWAT/TPF/SOU and is still training on a regular basis.
Besides the air crew has a fire axe.
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Yeah, I'm not sure what the training regimen Air Marshalls supposedly have but the only person I'd want armed is someone who is a veteran of some type of SWAT/TPF/SOU and is still training on a regular basis.
Besides the air crew has a fire axe.
In the event of a hijacking situation, you can rely on your onboard SWAT veteran to shoot your dog
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Yeah, I'm not sure what the training regimen Air Marshalls supposedly have but the only person I'd want armed is someone who is a veteran of some type of SWAT/TPF/SOU and is still training on a regular basis.
Besides the air crew has a fire axe.
In the event of a hijacking situation, you can rely on your onboard SWAT veteran to shoot your dog
Which one?
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In the event of a hijacking situation, you can rely on your onboard SWAT veteran to shoot your dog
Which one?
This is an exercise in point shooting and combat reflexes. You must rapidly and accurately select the suspect canine from the following lineup of dogs. Ready? Go!
(http://i.imgur.com/XVQr6.jpg)
(http://i.imgur.com/ThwzM.jpg)
(http://i.imgur.com/mdfNy.jpg)
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The middle one.
(http://i.imgur.com/ThwzM.jpg)
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Congratulations, pilot! You have successfully completed TSM-TSA-CN1: Din't Shoot Snoop Dogg. Please do not be alarmed by the possibility of a fatal mishap; Mr. Broadus is performing here today as a hologram
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(http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_3toweSXDukc/TUIJSI2IpoI/AAAAAAAAAAw/yVNunl65HYI/s1600/fist-pump-baby.jpg)
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Uh, actually, that one's been mythbusted. Shooting a hole in the plane does not result in explosive decompression.
Hell, planes have survived incidents in the air that left most of the upper fuselage missing and still landed without further incident.
So.... no, that's not why guns aren't allowed. Nor will special training allow you to magically not do damage to the plane.
I wasn't referring to "explosive decompression" (I know it was busted, and that it couldn't happen anyway). At high altitudes, sudden decompression could cause the crew to pass out from the lack of oxygen (though they do have masks to prevent that) and destabilize the plane. Of course, at lower altitudes, holes in the plane are less problematic, but airliners don't spend too much time flying low. Maybe I did a little overstatement by mentioning a crash, but the effects won't be good (nor cheap) and the plane won't be able to continue flight (it'd most likely land at the nearest airfield). And while special training wouldn't magically prevent you from damaging the plane, it'd reduce your chances of doing so to acceptable level.
id be more worried about hitting something else, like fuel, an engine or the pilots. other things that can **** you up, the apu, fuel lines, hydraulic lines, avionics, etc. the rate of decompression through a small bullet hole probibly wouldn't be very fast. there was a thing about it on atomic rockets on how to calculate the rate of decompression.
as for crew arming id limit them to tazers only, however there is ammunition which can be leathal to non-armored individuals but is not capable of damaging the aircraft, the rounds just break up on contact with a non-soft target. they will go through meat but not even get through drywall. i forget what they call them but they are often used in places where you dont want to do any collateral damage or accidentally kill people in other rooms with missed rounds. such weapons would only be issued to those with advanced combat training, where tazers and stunguns would be made available to crew who opt for emergency combat training. however using a leathal weapon in a "can of monkeys" sounds like a good way to kill a bunch of monkeys that get in the way.
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Yeah, I'm not sure what the training regimen Air Marshalls supposedly have
It's actually not just the Air Marshals, pretty much anybody in Federal law enforcement can take a class and get certified. It's apparently very boring.
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As far as decompression goes, it doesn't, unless the rate of decompression exceeds that aircraft's capacity to pressurize itself (IIRC, fresh air is fed either by the engines or an APU into the cabin, and air is released at the same rate, and if there is a leak, well, it compensates, up to a certain amount, which, I imagine, varies by aircraft design).
I do remember flying on a trans-atlantic flight and noticing that there was air leaking from around the seal on one of the doors. (As in, you could put your hand by it and feel the breeze.) I pointed it out to the flight attendant, who told me it was no big deal.
pre-EDIT: OK, I just checked, here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cabin_pressurization#Mechanics_of_pressurization (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cabin_pressurization#Mechanics_of_pressurization)
EDIT: Pressurization is achieved by the design of an airtight fuselage engineered to be pressurized with a source of compressed air and controlled by an environmental control system (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environmental_control_system) (ECS). The most common source of compressed air for pressurization is bleed air (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bleed_air) extracted from the compressor stage of a gas turbine (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gas_turbine) engine, from a low or intermediate stage and also from an additional high stage, the exact stage can vary, depending on engine type. By the time the cold outside air has reached the bleed air valves it is at a very high pressure and has been heated to around 200 °C (392 °F). The control and selection of high or low bleed sources is fully automatic and is governed by the needs of various pneumatic systems at various stages of flight.[12]
The part of the bleed air that is directed to the ECS, is then expanded and cooled to a suitable temperature by passing it through a heat exchanger (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heat_exchanger) and air cycle machine (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_cycle_machine) known as the packs system. In some of the larger airliners hot trim air can be added downstream of air conditioned air coming from the packs if it is needed to warm a section of the cabin that is colder than others.
At least two engines provide compressed bleed air for all of the plane's pneumatic systems, to provide full redundancy (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Redundancy_(engineering)). Compressed air is also obtained from the auxiliary power unit (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Auxiliary_power_unit) (APU), if fitted, in the event of an emergency and for cabin air supply on the ground before the main engines are started. Most modern commercial aircraft today have fully redundant, duplicated electronic controllers for maintaining pressurization along with a manual back-up control system.
All exhaust air is dumped to atmosphere via an outflow valve, usually at the rear of the fuselage. This valve controls the cabin pressure and also acts as a safety relief valve, in addition to other safety relief valves. In the event that the automatic pressure controllers fail, the pilot can manually control the cabin pressure valve, according to the backup emergency procedure checklist. The automatic controller normally maintains the proper cabin pressure altitude by constantly adjusting the outflow valve position so that the cabin altitude is as low as practical without exceeding the maximum pressure differential limit on the fuselage, which varies between different aircraft types but is normally around 8.6 psi. At 39,000 feet, the cabin pressure would be automatically maintained at about 6,900 ft (450 feet lower than Mexico City), which is about 11.5 psi of atmosphere pressure (79.3 kPa).[12]
Some aircraft, such as the Boeing 787 Dreamliner (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_787_Dreamliner), have re-introduced the use of electric compressors previously used on piston-engined airliners to provide pressurization.[13] The use of electric compressors increases the electrical generation load on the engines and introduces a number of stages of energy transfer, therefore it is unclear whether this increases the overall efficiency of the aircraft air handling system. It does, however, remove the danger of chemical contamination of the cabin, simplifies engine design, avoids the need to run high pressure pipework around the aircraft and provides greater design flexibility.
FYI, the APU on an aircraft is usually a small jet turbine.
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so i looked it up and found this:
How long will it take a spacecraft to decompress? (http://www.geoffreylandis.com/higgins.html)
it gives you the math to determine the rate of decompression for a spacecraft, decompression in an atmosphere is similar, so youd probibly have to subtract outside pressure from inside pressure before computing. it requires calculus, so im not going to pretend i completely understand it.
FYI, the APU on an aircraft is usually a small jet turbine.
thats the usual type of engine used in an apu, but the apu is the aircraft's power supply. it provides hydraulic pressure, pneumatic pressure, electricity, to name a few things.
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Assuming you knock out both engines used for air supply to the cabin, the APU, and any other backup system, that would allow you to compute how long it would take, sure..
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Assuming you knock out both engines used for air supply to the cabin, the APU, and any other backup system, that would allow you to compute how long it would take, sure..
heres the thing, if the rate of decompression is greater aircraft's systems capacity to repressurize, then you will lose pressure, otherwise you can maintain. the rate of re pressurization is likely really high, it has to keep up with the loss of outside air pressure as the aircraft climbs. your going to need to get pretty crazy with that gun to cause any critical damage though (and probibly need a ****ing assault rifle and/or knowledge of where all the critical stuff is).
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Yeah, and for a spacecraft, take into account the repressurization from on-board O2 supplies. Without knowing re-pressurization rate, you can't tell depressurization rate. Err... you know what I mean.
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everything you said sounds about right. post frenzy, lol.
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Yeah, I'm not sure what the training regimen Air Marshalls supposedly have but the only person I'd want armed is someone who is a veteran of some type of SWAT/TPF/SOU and is still training on a regular basis.
Besides the air crew has a fire axe.
Before the corporate meddlers took over the program, most air marshals were actually *that* kind of people, and the program had the most technically demanding small arms requirements of all the armed services in the USA.
The bureaucrats running the TSA and taking over the program didn't like that since it was hard to recruit, people with that kind of skill are rare... so they simply dropped the requirements.
http://youtu.be/r_VPVSNq5ek
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heres the thing, if the rate of decompression is greater aircraft's systems capacity to repressurize, then you will lose pressure, otherwise you can maintain. the rate of re pressurization is likely really high, it has to keep up with the loss of outside air pressure as the aircraft climbs. your going to need to get pretty crazy with that gun to cause any critical damage though...
... but, but, but: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pHXevnoAciY :)
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Not to mention what a troll with a gun could do.
This would be just as common as rolling through a red light to troll an 18 wheel semi truck- i.e. nobody would ever do it.
Another thing is that getting a CCW does require to take and complete classes and a background check, so the real idiots will most likely get filtered out anyway.
i forget what they call them but they are often used in places where you dont want to do any collateral damage or accidentally kill people in other rooms with missed rounds.
Frangible.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IqH177kJ7kg
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^yep thats the stuff.
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Not to mention what a troll with a gun could do.
This would be just as common as rolling through a red light to troll an 18 wheel semi truck- i.e. nobody would ever do it.
Another thing is that getting a CCW does require to take and complete classes and a background check, so the real idiots will most likely get filtered out anyway.
A CCW does not prepare you to be in a fight. A CCW does not prepare you to shoot a person, which is actually a small target when the adrenaline is flowing and you no longer have fine motor skills. Even advanced firearms courses don't really do that.
There is a reason why you frequently hear of many more shots fire in a police shooting incident than actually ever hit their target. It's not because the officers are bad shots; far from it. It's because people's abilities deteriorate to their worst day of training when they enter a high-stress scenario. Cortisol and adrenaline do ****ty things.
Now, combine the mentality required to actually shoot a person, the skill and training required to actually hit with every shot, and the knowledge required to know when and how it's appropriate to engage and escalate to firearm use, and there is a VERY good cluster of reasons why civilians never should and never will be allowed to carry any sort of weapon, nevermind a handgun, on a commercial aircraft.
A couple weeks ago I was doing my annual defensive tactics recertification for work, a number of the instructors for which are active-duty tactical officers on various teams around British Columbia, and one day we got a very useful lecture on "surviving a critical incident" from a tactical officer who was shot at multiple times in close quarters, and was ultimately able to disengage before firing upon (and ultimately killing) the gang member in question. I asked him afterwards, because this occurred in public, if in hindsight he had any feelings on the civilian bystanders who called 911 but did not physically intervene - he said he preferred that they stay out of it because they could honestly have been more of a liability than assistance. This tactical officer fired at the subject from 25 feet away and hit him three times out of four bullets. But cortisol and adrenaline are funny things - he swears to this day that he fired only three shots and has no recollection of the fourth whatsoever, despite having watched the CCTV footage later. That's a tactical officer with 15+ years experience on a tactical team.
The only people carrying weapons in aircraft should be law enforcement with specific and advanced training completed in order to do so. Anyone else is just a terrifying thought all around.