United Airlines 767 returns to Newark after Bluetooth name sparks alert

Post by [deleted] » Mon, Jun 01, 2026, 3:36 AM UTC

godelski wrote: post #379

Eridrus wrote: post #189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is trying to sanewash totally insane levels of risk aversion. Do you think terrorists are really going to name their Bluetooth speaker "bomb"? Do you think this behaviour has any meaningful true positives? This is the kind of brainworms thinking that has people throwing our their 150ml liquids out at TSA and taking their shoes off.

> This is trying to sanewash totally insane levels of risk aversion. To add more credence to your point, let's not forget this beautiful line in TFA | During this incident, a Wi-Fi hotspot named "Free Palestine, F Zionists" prompted the pilot to issue a warning to the cabin, telling the passenger responsible that they had "30 seconds" to remove the name or the FBI would meet the aircraft. This is clearly not a threat…

Post by mvdtnz » Mon, Jun 01, 2026, 3:47 AM UTC

umpalumpaaa wrote: post #488

wat10000 wrote: post #290

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t buy it. I understand protecting people’s sensibilities by avoiding these words. That part makes sense. Same basic politeness as not using curse words in my variable names. But to turn an entire flight around because of a Bluetooth device name? How does that make any rational sense? Look at it from a Bayesian perspective. There’s some probability P that there’s a bomb on a random plane. Now, given that a speci…

It was not only because of the name. I think a big part of the turn around was the non compliance by the passengers. They were asked to turn off all Bluetooth devices but did not.

Post by halapro » Mon, Jun 01, 2026, 3:50 AM UTC

cmurf wrote: post #286

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #187

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> if the plane blew up and it came out that some passengers had posted online that there was a “bomb” blue tooth device and they didn’t turn around This story is just stupid. If you actually think you have a bomb onboard, you divert to the nearest airport. (And if you think you discovered a bomb accidentally left discoverable, you don’t ask for it to be please turned off.) The pilots and crew knew they were being idi…

I expect pilots called company, and risk assessment made the decision. Pilots can and do make flight safety decisions, but operational control is an airline decision.

Post by willy_k » Mon, Jun 01, 2026, 3:54 AM UTC

pdonis wrote: post #500

NoMoreNicksLeft wrote: post #497

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>even a tiny probability that it might be a threat has to be paid attention What if it had been named "Teddy Ruxpin is my friend", but the pilot doesn't know whether that's a secret code for "I'm going to release aerosol sarin nerve gas on the plane"? Should he react to all messages as if they are threats, because no matter how small the risk is, more than zero is too much? If you can't know whether something is a th…

> What if it had been named "Teddy Ruxpin is my friend", but the pilot doesn't know whether that's a secret code for "I'm going to release aerosol sarin nerve gas on the plane"? I'm unable to find any connection between Teddy Ruxpin and sarin gas online, so I don't see why a pilot would make such a connection. Am I missing something? > If you can't know whether something is a threat or not, the only reasonable respon…

Post by srean » Mon, Jun 01, 2026, 3:56 AM UTC

Eridrus wrote: post #189

neilv wrote: post #178

I once consulted on some aviation-related software (not the safety work prominent on my resume), and a company announcement came through, that you must never use a few specific words commonly heard in software development. The two no-no words I recall were "crash" and "bomb". Don't write them in code or documents, don't say them on the phone or videoconf, etc. Those terms have senses that people in aviation take extr…

This is trying to sanewash totally insane levels of risk aversion. Do you think terrorists are really going to name their Bluetooth speaker "bomb"? Do you think this behaviour has any meaningful true positives? This is the kind of brainworms thinking that has people throwing our their 150ml liquids out at TSA and taking their shoes off.