How about a round of applause to crew resources for waiting until the absolute last possible moment to schedule training for bid that was awarded 6 months ago!

No, I didn't have anything that I needed to plan for.:mad:

Without using the technology of the backscatter machines, how do you propose that the TSA finds and stops the underwear bomber at the checkpoint so that your flight is safe for travel?

Really? Think they'll hide it there again?

There is no easy way to find the next place they'll try......cause that is called a cavity search.

You don't think they would hide it there again if they know that there is nothing the TSA can do to find it? Really? :rolleyes:

Breaking News: Delta Flight Makes Emergency Landing in Mumbai Due to Suspicious Object in Cargo Hold, India News Outlets Reporting

I saw this headline on Fox but haven't heard or read anything yet. Anyone else see anything?

All the groups in the world could come together and protest this and it would do nothing more than tilt at the windmill. This is about control, not security. No court, except for maybe the 9th Circuit, would hold these Unconstitutional. This is perhaps GWB's greatest mistake as president, allowing a government takeover of transportation security.

Liberty, once ceded, is rarely returned without bloodshed.

Sorry to beat this horse even deader. ;)

While I agree with your sentiment wholeheartedly, it's a moot point once we've set foot in the airport and voluntarily and willingly subjected ourselves to the screening process. Outside the airport terminal, whenever a police officer accosts an individual and restrains his freedom to walk away, he has 'seized' that person. To give the TSA this amount of power is to give them a big step down the path of totalitarianism. But again, flying isn't a right and the Fourth Amendment won't protect us from what we might consider an unreasonable search.

That's a great question, but not what you originally asked and not what my answer was for.

You asked: Which Constitutional right is being violated?

I answered: Unreasonable search and seizure. Privacy. Neither is an absolute right. Both must be weighed, benefit vs. infringement.

As a pilot, can we as a group say we are separate from the public and the risks we pose to the system are minimal and any intrusive search on us is unconstitutional? Yes. Can we argue that the alternative backscatter machines pose an unsafe health risk to us over the normal traveling public because of our already high exposure to radiation and the only option we have is to go through the "excessive search?" Yup. Can we say this search is unreasonable in light of the fact that we undergo heightened security checks and background searches? Absolutely.

If you want me to find a better way for the TSA to stop the underwear bomber, that's not my job. Force everyone through the bacskatter machine if need be.

My concern is for us as pilots. Is the TSA slowly killing us by bombarding us with excessive x-rays 10 times a month? In light of all the scrutiny we go through already, are they trampling on our rights by "frisking" us when we pose a minimal threat to the system?

How many pilots have been caught with a bomb between their nuts? If the number is zero, we have a case to be made that the frisk is unreasonable and unconstitutional.

New K

Ya' know, the problem with the argument "you don't HAVE to travel on an airplane" is, it's not too far a stretch until you're at the "you don't HAVE to walk down the sidewalk/leave your house" argument. Where, exactly, do you draw the line (of reason) of the "you don't have to...." at? I know I don't "have to" go to work. Heck, I don't have to draw the next breath....unless I choose to. I guess my libertarian bias is showing (again).
Chuck

DAL Emergency Landing .. Suspicious Package