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Flying today has become a pain. I now think twice about trips with air travel as part of my vacation planning. For years I trotted off to the airport with not a care in the world and the flight would take me somewhere exotic. Now it’s a pain in the derriere. Pun intended.
It’s not just the current news reports about excessive body searches. It’s the entire experience that has gone from a feeling of luxury and high-end travel to feeling like a porn star on a budget. Many years ago it was an absolute treat to go off on a trip with the airport as my first stop on the way to a fabulous vacation. Vacations are usually planned for quite some time and I’ve always found the time leading up to a vacation almost the best part.
I once traveled with two friends and for weeks we had meetings at coffee shops to discuss our trip and our plans and we brought maps to our meetings and practiced our destination language and by the time we were ready to go we could barely contain ourselves. Rather than take the airport shuttle my son volunteered to drive us to the airport and he spent over an hour listening to three giggling teens. We were all well over 40 (and a couple of us over 50) but we were giggling teens.
But we live in a dangerous world so air travel isn’t what it used to be. In fact, recently I dropped my daughter and her boyfriend off at the airport and as we arrived at the drop off location I barely had time to pull over, open the hatch for their luggage, and shove them off on the pavement before the security officer marched to my window and barked at me to move‑‑‑now. I started to explain we just got there but she had turned from me and had started barking at the kids. They had barely unbuckled their seatbelts. I didn’t even get to hug them. As I pulled away I looked in my rearview mirror hoping for a little wave and they were still in the street gathering their belongings with the security officer looming over them. They couldn’t even stop to look at me and wave.
When they came back two weeks later I arrived at the airport a bit early but didn’t park (we stopped parking years ago) and had to circle the arrival zone three times before they appeared. I had hoped to slow down and stall a bit since we were communicating by cell phone and they were almost at the pick-up point but each time I cruised by the area I was scooted away by a security guard. Finally, they were outside as I drove by and they literally threw their things in the back and jumped in the car and as a security guard approached I sped off. I was tempted to stick out my tongue but I knew that would land me in prison for engaging in an act of terrorism. We mostly use airport shuttles but sometimes they don't work out so we drive.
Check-in is not much better. We used to arrive at the airport an hour before our flight and sometimes we would see others arriving much later than that but still they managed to get on the plane. I remember thinking it was silly to arrive so early since those that arrived late didn’t have any problems. Those days are gone and will never return. I have friends who now spend the night at airport hotels even though they live fairly close because they are terrified of being late.
As to the “mystery” of the airplane’s operation, I had never had a fear of flying (my apologies to Erica Jong and her wonderful book of the same title, albeit a somewhat different topic) in the early years and I always marched along to my plane without a care in the world. In those years we could smoke on planes and I was a smoker and I smoked my way across the planet with not a worry in the world while sipping cocktails! I had great faith in the airplane mechanics, the pilots, the flight attendants, and air traffic control. My smoking habit was much more dangerous than flying.
So without a true fear of flying I just had an occasional annoyance with certain passengers and sometimes on long flights I got a little stir crazy and had to walk around a bit but I never considered these issues a problem. Today I am slightly fearful. It isn’t the thought of what it takes to get those things up in the air, which is absolutely astounding if we think about it too long and it’s not a good idea to do that, but I have that tiny seed of worry about someone on the plane intending to do harm to the passengers and/or the country of origin and/or destination. It’s tiny so far and won’t keep me from flying but I hate that my carefree ride to the airport is now not as carefree. I do feel that little bit of fear. Could be my age? No, it’s terrorism. There. I’ve said it. It’s not the flying I fear, it’s the suddenly not flying caused by an evil entity.
Yet, the security measures that are set in place currently are bizarre. If I have a choice I guess I’d choose the scanner instead of the touching. Some day we’ll have pat downs done by a robot and if it detects a suspicious item it will simply detonate the passenger. Robots will be perfect and never make mistakes. You know, just like our computers.
Recently we’ve all heard that security personnel have gotten a bit heavy handed on the pat downs. In fact, it has now reached the level of out and out groping. And these folks are feeling stress because they believe they are simply doing their job as trained to protect the public then we gripe at them for doing it. There are also sniffing dogs and sometimes they can be a bit exuberant and depending on one’s stature it is akin to pointy nose rape. As to the scanners, I think we now all go to the airport wishing we had lost a few pounds and wondering if we remembered to wear our new underwear. The scanners show all body deficiencies (and holding our stomachs in doesn’t help).
All of it is worrisome but not as worrisome as a plane exploding in mid air so we endure. We gripe and we hate it but we endure. The irony is that all the passenger screenings in the world are not protecting the passengers from disaster because the planes carry cargo that is often unscreened. Is anyone groping the cargo?
Cargo is shipped by the tons every day in the cargo sections of commercial flights for revenue purposes, according to the National Transportation Safety Board. Passengers might undergo invasive crotch groping but the cargo beneath their seats may never have been touched by human hands or by x-rays or sniffing dogs. I just did a few searches and found dozens of articles on the topic of cargo on passenger planes. I’m not a terrorist so that information is safe with me. But I know about it so I think terrorists know about it too and it’s only a matter of time before something happens. It’s a ticking time bomb. Pun intended, again.
Some “officials” claim that every piece of cargo shipped on a U.S. passenger flight has been screened for bombs. Really? Given the number and type of bombs available, especially when the bomb-maker doesn’t need to fear detection since he/she isn’t there, that would mean screening processes of enormous proportions. Can they really claim they have the capability to screen for all possible explosive devices known to exist at every single airport in the world? And through various packaging designs and types that are sealed? I think not. Even in the passenger screenings we missed the shoe bomber and the underwear bomber.
Some of the cargo that makes its way onto passenger flights is loaded in places that don't screen every piece—or screen at all. There are all types and sizes of airports. And things can happen to cargo in hundreds of places on the way to its destination. It could leave clean from its factory and arrive at one airport having been tainted along the way, or land in another airport and something can be attached to it at that location, and then it leaves without screening. Do we really think that every time a plane lands it’s re-screened? An entire planeload of cargo? Nope, I don't think so. Yet the passengers have had close, personal, and invasive encounters with security without so much as a dinner date before boarding. I’m missing the logic there. Is it window dressing to make us feel secure by annoying us with groping so we assume we’re safe? Irritated but secure? Doesn’t work for me.
Years ago there were no security checks per se. Luggage had to be appropriately closed with nothing hanging out and locked securely. Today we can’t lock anything. Carry on items were looked at externally to make sure they were not too big or too unmanageable but were not examined internally. Maybe an occasional peek inside. I used to knit on airplanes. I’d be in big trouble arriving with knitting needles today. There are actually people who fly today who have never flown without walking through a metal detector or guards checking them out. There were no surveillance cameras of the type we have today. If they had them they were looking at traffic flow and thievery not for terrorists and bombs. And our family and friends walked to the departure gates to wave us off and met us at the arrival gates to receive their gifts and hug us.
I don't mind someone groping my body while I’m waiting to board a plane, but I’d like to be handed an affidavit declaring that the cargo was just completely and thoroughly groped as well by the personnel loading the plane. If I could have that piece of paper I think I’d feel better about a body search, with x-rays or hands. Without that guarantee, we’re all being molested for nothing. It probably isn’t a huge surprise to learn the reason the cargo isn’t THOROUGHLY screened is cost. Airlines complain the cost would be exorbitant and would be passed on to the customers who would not like that one bit. So if airlines make that statement (here’s the fun part) how can the aforementioned “officials” say it’s all screened? The airlines say it isn’t, the officials say it is. I hate to be a logical person. It can screw up my day when I hear things like that. There’s a concept problem there. I bet some of us would prefer better cargo screening. Knowing the cargo was cleared might make the passenger groping more tolerable. Then there are x-rays from equipment with questionable safety checks because checking those machines routinely is‑‑expensive.
I still don't fear the flying process itself. Just the bomb part. For those that have never liked to be thrust in the air in a thin metal tube thousands of miles up in the sky, having security reminding them that mad bombers are everywhere, cannot be pleasant for those fearful fliers. I have an aunt who will never fly or take a train. This started years before bombs on planes and trains. We tried to change her mind but we gave up.
So I think I’ll just drive to Yosemite. But wait. There are bears at Yosemite. Maybe snakes. Rabid animals. The beach? No! Sharks! (And hypodermic needles in the sand.) To fly or not to fly. That is the question. (Yeah, my apologies to Shakespeare too.)
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