Correct me if I'm wrong, but if ya' wanna' blow up an airplane

[flamin lib]

wouldn't it be easier to use a handheld GPS and a stick of dynamite? If they don't screen cargo (not meaning checked luggage, but commercial shipments) couldn't a GPS be used to detonate such a parcel post package when it neared it's destination?

Is commercial cargo screened? If not, is there a problem with the above scenario?

As I recall the Lockerbie tragedy was a suitcase in checked baggage with an altimeter triggered device.

[fooj]

1. I've been posting this all morning...

IMO, this is a complete exercise in CONTROL. Why can't someone bring a chapstick on a plane yet only 10% of our check-in luggage across the country is scanned for bombing materials? That means all of these long lines and "security" checks really mean NOTHING, eh? Who cares if I have a lipstick tube with me if the belly of my plane is FULL OF EXPLOSIVES? Think about it.

[paparush]

2. What are you a secret terrahist operative? A one man cell?

Why do you hate Bush's freedom to hate our freedom?

[Richard Steele]

3. Yes. nm

[El Supremo]

4. They don't have dynamite.

It proves how amateurish they are. Gatorade & peroxide, shoe bombs, box cutters. I think they just want to become martyrs.

[Mabus]

8. I blame MacGyver

They must have syndicated his show overseas. There's no better explanation.

An entertaining show which has brought the hero, Richard Dean Anderson's character MacGyver, beyond simple proper noun to verb -- one can now MacGyver something. MacGyver, along with his friend Pete Thornton (Dana Elcar) invariably find trouble. To escape, rescue, defend, thwart, and generally meddle, MacGyver applies the laws of chemistry and physics to everyday objects. Each episode ends with MacGyver "MacGyvering" his way out of, through, over, or into trouble. http://imdb.com/title/tt0088559/episodes

[The_Casual_Observer]

5. If you were a police undercover agent who had watched

Die Hard 3 too many times you wouldn't do it any other way.

[global1]

6. Because The Sheeple Can't See The Cargo Being Checked....

but they can see and are affected by the security at the airport. This makes them feel safer.

[truebrit71]

7. Cargo is 100% in the UK. The "making 'murrka safe' GOP haven't...

...been able to get that on the top of their priorities...after all there's all those tax gifts to the rich to hand out.... :eyes:

[TreasonousBastard]

9. Actually, cargo is screened better than...

luggage in most places.

I haven't been dealing with cargo terminals since last year, but as of then every package sent as cargo is opened and checked by cargo personnel in the cargo terminal. This also goes for those express packages.

There are always exceptions, such as poisonous snakes in secured crates, hearts for transplant, human remains in coffins, and some "known shippers" who are on an approved list after being checked out pretty carefully.

But, yeah, I've waited around for ridiculously long times when short-staffed cargo crews checked that it was really shoes, motherboards, tomatoes, or whatever else was claimed to be in the box.

(Really-- poisonous snakes. I was in a terminal once when a reptile dealer came in with a large, and very sturdy, crate labelled "Poisonous Reptiles" with lots of big bolts and locks on it. For some curious reason, no one asked him to open it. They knew him, of course, and he ships several times a week, they said, so they didn't worry about it.)

[Lisa]

10. so apparently there really is a procedure for putting snakes on a plane!

I used to work for a research lab which shipped all kinds of weird stuff -- chemicals, live animals, bizarre electronic devices, liquid nitrogen, etc. -- this was back in the 1980s-90s, and I shudder to think of the paperwork which that likely involves now.

[Bucky]

12. That's it! From now on I only get on planes if Samuel L Jackson is there!

In a pinch, I'll take Leslie Nielson, but even then it'd have to be a VERY important flight.

[Bucky]

11. Not sure of your source, but my friend who works airport security says...

...they do check for a wide range of explosives and the screening has redundancies built in. But the "control" issue others raise is salient. A lot of this martyr business is a substitute for masterbation.