Discussion: Airport Screenings, Procedures, And Other Travel-Related Issues II

[The Squirrel]

Isn't that old? Or did it happen again?

 

[Marx]

Isn't that old? Or did it happen again?

I believe it is an updated story. The woman was doing a tv interview.

 

[enterthemadness]

http://www.infowars.com/tsa-invades-roads-highways-with-vipr-checkpoints/

Any of this real?

Homeland Security is also developing technology to be used at “security events” which purports to monitor “malintent” on behalf of an individual who passes through a checkpoint. The video below explains how “Future Attribute Screening Technology” (FAST) checkpoints will conduct “physiological” and “behavioral” tests in order to weed out suspected terrorists and criminals.
The clip shows individuals who attend “security events” being led into trailers before they are interrogated as to whether they are terrorists while lie detector-style computer programs analyze their physiological responses. The subjects are asked about their whereabouts, and if they are attempting to smuggle bombs or recording devices into the “expo,” proving that the technology is intended to be used at public events and not just airports. Individuals who do not satisfy the first lie detector-style test are then asked “additional questions”.

 

[Thread Manager]

This is a continuation thread, the old thread is [split]332820[/split]

 

[celldog]

The issue of keeping Burkas out of the west for security reasons seen to be lost on most of you. So I could assume that you are down with this too::

Uproar follows imams' detention
The removal of six Muslim clerics from a US Airways flight from the Twin Cities set off a nationwide uproar, and the Department of Homeland Security's Office for Civil Rights and Civil Liberties said it will review the incident.
Bob Von Sternberg and Pamela Miller, Star Tribune

From now on, Omar Shahin won't be praying at the airport while waiting for a flight.
"This was humiliating, the worst moment of my life," Shahin said Tuesday, a day after he and five fellow Muslim imams were escorted off a US Airways jet at Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport.

"To practice your faith and pray is a crime in America?" he said.

The incident set off a nationwide uproar, and the Department of Homeland Security's Office for Civil Rights and Civil Liberties said it will review the incident.

Bloggers and talk radio buzzed about the need to be vigilant against potential terrorists, while civil rights advocates and Muslim leaders cried foul. The national Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) called for a congressional hearing about ethnic and religious profiling at airports.

Locally, the Jewish Community Relations Council of Minnesota and the Dakotas and the Somali Justice Advocacy Center questioned the detention.

Bushra Khan, spokeswoman for CAIR's Arizona chapter, said, "All these men did was pray, and it was misunderstood. The bottom line is that they were Middle Eastern-looking men ... and that scares some people."

US Airways said that it will fully investigate the matter and that passenger safety is paramount.

The religious leaders were heading home after a three-day North American Imams Federation conference in Bloomington.

The pilot ordered the men off the flight after their praying, conversation and behavior alarmed several passengers and flight attendants.

The imams denied that they did or said anything that could be considered threatening. They were released without charges after being questioned for five hours by federal law enforcement officials.

Left behind by US Airways

Shahin, president of the imams' group, called for a boycott of US Airways after an agent and his supervisor, without giving a reason, refused to sell him replacement tickets Tuesday morning.

"I'm not going to stay silent," Shahin said. "I came to this country to enjoy justice and freedom."

The US Airways supervisor told Shahin that his tickets had been refunded and that he would have to go to another airline. The supervisor offered Shahin a customer service phone number.

"I want to go home. I don't want phone numbers," Shahin said. "They have no reason to refuse service to us just because of the way we look."

He bought six one-way tickets at the Northwest Airlines counter, and the men flew to Phoenix without incident.

'Praying very loud'

In a statement to police, a US Airways gate agent wrote that three of the men prayed in Arabic at the gate. "I was suspicious by the way they were praying very loud," the gate agent said.

Said Shahin: "We were never bothering anyone, not saying anything loudly. We were just prostrating ourselves, the normal way we pray."

Devout Muslims pray five times a day, but practices vary among cultural groups, said Owais Bayunus, a Muslim scholar in the Twin Cities.

"Those who pray in the airport would be more conservative Muslims who stop to pray at the designated times no matter where they are," he said. "Others accept the fatwa [an opinion by an Islamic legal scholar] that it is acceptable to combine the prayers during travel."

Before passengers boarded, one became alarmed by an overheard discussion. "They seemed angry," he wrote in a police statement. "Mentioned 'U.S.' and 'killing Saddam.' Two men then swore slightly under their breath/mumbled. They spoke Arabic again. The gate called boarding for the flight. The men then chanted 'Allah, Allah, Allah.' "

Marwan Sadeddin, another of the imams, said, "What bothers me the most is these false statements and lies that we were shouting, 'Allah, Allah.' This never happened."

Another, Ahmad Shqeirat, said, "That is a lie. We were not talking politics. And even if we did, so what? What is suspicious about that?"

Once the six were seated, two in front, two in the middle and two in back, and paid visits to each other to chat, some passengers became alarmed, the police report said. One passed a note to a flight attendant citing the alleged comments about Allah and Saddam.

Flight attendants alerted the pilot, who called airport police and asked them to remove the men from the plane. They left "cooperatively," according to the police report.

A bomb-sniffing dog examined the men, their luggage and the entire airplane and found nothing. The plane left for Phoenix about three hours late after the other 141 passengers reboarded.

After being questioned by agents of the U.S. Marshals Service, the FBI, the Secret Service and the Transportation Security Administration, the men were released.

Asad Zaman, communications director for the Muslim American Society (MAS) of Minnesota, said an Arizona MAS chapter member called him for help about 11 p.m. Monday because the six imams had not arrived and one had called his wife to say police had detained them.

Within 10 minutes of a Minnesota imam's call to police, the six were free, Zaman said.

"This event would be the equivalent of Roman Catholic bishops being arrested in China because they wore clerical robes and invoked Jesus Christ in prayers," Zaman said.

 

[Marx]

FLIGHT ATTENDANT PUTS BABY IN OVERHEAD BIN AS A JOKE
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/03/06/virgin-blue-flight-attend_n_831948.html

 

[enterthemadness]

http://www.naturalnews.com/031603_surveillance_police_state.html

(NaturalNews) Newly-released documents obtained by the Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC) reveal that the US Depart of Homeland Security has been working on plans to roll out a new wave of mobile surveillance technologies at train stations, stadiums and streets. These new technologies will track your eye movements, capture and record your facial dimensions for face-recognition processing, bathe you in X-rays to look under your clothes, and even image your naked body using whole-body infrared images that were banned from consumer video cameras because they allowed the camera owners to take "nude" videos of people at the beach.

This ain't a conspiracy theory. I've clicked on the document link in the article and it's 173 pages dated from summer of 2006. I haven't got the time to read all 173 pages, but I did skim over the first few pages.

 

[chaseter]

The terrorists have already won. We live in a state of constant fear and are slowly becoming an autocratic police state.

 

[Paradoxium]

TSA to retest airport body scanners for radiation

 

[Marx]

They are 'retesting' them? That doesn't sound good...

 

[Gamma Ray]

If I fly into America I'm going to request a pat-down. **** the machines.

 

[Kelly]

TSA to retest airport body scanners for radiation

I certainly think they should, at least to find out how much radiation those that fly frequently are getting....

 

[enterthemadness]

Sickening. TSA can go piss off into a lake.

http://www.presstv.ir/usdetail/174315.html

 

[Marx]

Shameful.

CBS, CNN, and HLN have picked up this story.

 

[Docker2.0]

http://news.yahoo.com/video/politics-15749652/tsa-frisks-6-year-old-parents-speak-out-24890589

Is it? I honestly understand why it was done but it seems to be causing a uproar. I have seen people smuggle drugs into the country in their babies diapers and it's ok to search the baby then but now that the suspect doesn't look like a terrorists.............just saying. Anyone have an opinion about this? If this is an old topic I apologize because I haven't been coming to this forum for a minute but hopefully it's not.

 

[Kelly]

My main problem with it is, the fact that there are PROVEN ways to profile, the Israeli's have done it for years in their airports, and they have an excellent history in that respect. I would rather see that happening, than being subjected to an x-ray machine, or someone using very evasive measures in a pat down that our police do when people are being arrested....IF IT WERE someone in the military, or actual trainded law enforcement doing the pat down, I would have much less problem with it....but its not, it is poorly trained, pretty much....people off the street, and that IMO is ridiculous.

 

[Docker2.0]

Glad someone responded because I have absolutely no problem with this. When it was mexicans who were suspected of bringing drugs in(no matter the age because again, parents have been known to hide drugs in the babies and kids, or people with turbans(f the spelling )then people have no problems with it because it's all about security and if you don't like it, then don't come here. But because this girl's dad is a doctor, oh it's not right and this is wrong, we need to do something about this. Not arguing with you Kel but just saying that this has bothered me for a minute and to be honest it is profiling and I'm just glad that an all american family got a taste of it.

 

[Lunar_Wolf]

I got a plane from Dublin to Manchester(40 min flight). Between that time I just want to nap to feel refreshed for more travel. I found it impossible to sleep due to the never ending promotions through the speakers. I tried to listen to music, but they asked I remove my headphones. Ugh.

 

[Timstuff]

First the nudie scanners and groping, and now this...

TSA Officer Admits Plot to Post Porn on Christian Site

http://patriotupdate.com/articles/tsa-employee-hacks-christian-site-posts-explicit-pics

 

[Timstuff]

Airport passenger screener charged in distributing child pornography

http://articles.philly.com/2011-04-...an-ann-davis-child-pornography-federal-agents

 

[Kelly]

Greeeaaaatttt, just what you want feeling you up....excellent.../sarcasm/

 

[Marx]

Good grief...

 

[Timstuff]

How is the TSA supposed to screen our luggage when they can't even screen their own employees?

 

[Marx]

UPDATE: ANOTHER AIR TRAFFIC CONTROLLER FIRED FOR SLEEPING ON THE JOB
http://www.cnn.com/2011/TRAVEL/04/25/air.traffic.controller.fired/index.html?hpt=T2

 

[Morg]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap_travel/20110430/ap_tr_ge/us_travel_brief_airport_pat_downs_texas