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El-Al (the Israeli National Airline) has the toughest security measures of any airline. It probably would not be practical to introduce their system because of home many hours ~ thats right ~ hours of prescreening check in it takes before a passenger is allowed to board an aircraft! Furthermore, if these types of programs were to be instituted, organizations such as the ACLU would be screaming bloody murder and there would undoubtly be lawsuits galore!

The last time I traveled overseas commerically overseas was in the mid 1980's, and it was on El-Al. Here is what happened on a direct 747 flight from N.Y. to Tel Aviv.

Arrived in N.Y. about 6 or 8 hrs prior to El-Al departure. The El-Al terminal was sealed and closed. El-Al security told me to grab a cab and do some sight seeing in N.Y. for a couple of hrs....kind of difficult w/the amount of luggage I had. After an arguement, they allowed me to crash in the terminal for a few hrs. of rest.

Preparations for boarding started about 4hrs or so prior to departure. 4*8 card tables were lined up ended to end and the passengers formend several lines. All had their turn being interrogated by security...why are you going to Israel, what is your business, how long are you staying and on and on... Furthermore, ALL bagage (carry on and checked) was physcially opened and inspected. All bagage was also subject to x-ray and metal detection!

Two thirds or more of the Flight Attendants were men, and people who you did not wish to mess with! There were also plain clothed security officers attached to the flight.

Then you have to deal with the question "what objects might passengers bring aboard that could conceivably be used as weapons?". It would be impractical to have a fixed list of forbidden items. I think what they've done is try to create such a list, but also leave it open-ended by forbidding sharp or pointed objects in general. Zero-tolerance is the rule. So with that many screeners and screening points, it's inevitable that someone will invoke the zero-tolerance rule on someone's military awards or something else that seems dumb. But either there's zero-tolerance or there isn't. I'm not sure I want those screeners making independent decisions on what is a potential weapon and what isn't.

If we had 25% effectiveness at screening out weapons and such before Sept. 11th, and 75% effectiveness now, then progress has been made. 100% is impossible. So if you measure it that way, the beefed-up security has to be considered something of a success. Also, it's much more likely that an evildoer-wannabe would get caught now, thus possibly deterring them from trying in the first place. The system will NEVER be perfect though.

Even worse, wait until a damned bee gets past your windshield on your Hog, slams you in the face, drops in your lap, and starts stinging you in an unmentionable place. That happened to me once, and I was surprised at how fast I stopped that damn Hog of mine.

Jeeze...that hurt.

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I'll give you 100% safety or 100% freedom; You choose!!

The current airline "security" measures are just PR to make the lemmings feel safe.

But the real issue is that terrorists look for the path of least resistance. If you wrap air travel up in security paranoia, the bad guys will just go for something else.

Example: a friend of mine came to stay last weekend, and she managed to leave her suitcase on the train. She realised this just as we were walking down the platform and it was accelerating towards Newcastle. You could get quite a respectable bomb inside that suitcase and if it went off in a packed railway carriage doing 120mph the result would be a pretty hefty insurance claim.

The fact is that we don't operate the same level of security for rail travel, e.g. ensuring that luggage always embarks and disembarks with its owner, which is what routinely happens with aircraft. I accept that with air travel the security is probably necessary because a falling aircraft would cause far greater damage to buildings and people on the ground than an exploding GNER express somewhere in the Vale of York. But we accept a certain level of risk when we do anything. The best way to minimise it is by going after the people who cause the problems rather than restricting the lives of innocent citizens.