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Heathrow scraps liquid container limit

bbc.com

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Re: Heathrow scraps liquid container limit

#711

Post by randusername »

jandrewrogers wrote: post #71

This just adds confusion as to the purpose of all this. The motivation behind the liquid limits is that there are extremely powerful explosives that are stable water-like liquids. Average people have never heard of them because they aren’t in popular lore. There has never been an industrial or military use, solids are simpler. Nonetheless, these explosives are easily accessible to a knowledgeable chemist like me. The…

I would not be surprised if this started out totally unrelated to explosives. Say that some toddler spilled an entire 3 liters of grape soda all over the plane. Or a hypochondriac brought cleaning agents aboard and gave everyone a headache.

Mostly sarcasm, but man do I see this pattern a lot. The risk mitigation apparatus is called in for something, they see an opportunity to overgeneralize and prevent an entire new category of potential mishaps, and the everyday folk end up really confused trying to reconcile the rules with their intent.

Reminds me of the parable about the bench guards. Is there an aphorism for this?

Re: Heathrow scraps liquid container limit

#712

Post by drob518 »

fc417fc802 wrote: post #413
drob518 wrote: post #341

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You still need metal parts, notably a gun barrel capable of holding extreme pressures until the bullet gets up to speed. That isn’t plastic. The grip and frame might be plastic, but not the barrel.

This is either incorrect or only technically correct. In the context of smuggling a weapon through a metal detector at a checkpoint there are nonferrous and even entirely plastic variants. Possessing them is generally illegal because essentially the only purpose is for assassinations.

Those are exotic parts that would have to be manufactured specially. You don’t buy them off the shelf. They are costly to procure and difficult to work with. One doesn’t just load up the 3d printer and push Go. To be clear, I’m sure a homemade gun can be passed through a metal detector checkpoint, but that requires some real thought and skill. More than likely, the real weak link at the checkpoint is not the detector “seeing” the gun but the half-asleep agent missing it, given the red-teaming results which show even very traditional firearms have a good chance of slipping through.

Re: Heathrow scraps liquid container limit

#713

Post by ultrahax »

VBprogrammer wrote: post #710
givemeethekeys wrote: post #692

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Worst and most aggressive pat down I have ever experienced was in Toronto for no reason that I can think of, so I have learned to be stoic about all interactions with gate keepers, regardless of country. You never know when someone had a bad cup of tea just before the met you.

New York is the worst security I've ever come through for just being needlessly horrible. Like screaming at people because they didn't literally put their feet on the "footprints" on the floor. Toronto was fine. Just a slightly incredulous conversation about how we could take 3 weeks off to travel Canada.

Only time I have ever been shouted at by personnel in an airport was at JFK.

Re: Heathrow scraps liquid container limit

#714

Post by lavezzi »

Halan wrote: post #344

How is this news? A lot of airports in Europe had had this for years and even in England there were terminals within the major hubs where this was already the norm

Because Heathrow markets itself as a world class airport and they have been woefully behind the times with regards to updating their security tech

Re: Heathrow scraps liquid container limit

#715

Post by krisoft »

WalterBright wrote: post #166
CorrectHorseBat wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So how does that explain I can take 10 100ml bottles and an empty 1l bottle through security but not 1 full 1l bottle?

The same reason used for WA emissions inspections (since suspended). If your tailpipe emitted 99ppm of pollutants, you were good to go. If it emitted 100ppm, you had to get it fixed. Good ole step functions.

I don't get your point about the tailpipe emissions. Of course there is a hard cutoff. What else could there be? Do you want them to gently suggest that you should maybe fix your car above 90ppm, and then rudely suggest from 95ppm?

The response they can do is that they either let you use the car or not let you use the car. That is binary. Technically they cannot even do that. All they can do is promise you that if you use your non-compliant car and they find it out they will fine you. Laws are after all just formalised threats backed by force.

Re: Heathrow scraps liquid container limit

#716

Post by cyberax »

ch4s3 wrote: post #534
cyberax wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

BS. Full body scans are amazing, and should be added to the normal health screening along with blood tests. Doctors need to get out of the headspace where an MRI is something reserved only to confirm the terminal cancer diagnosis. Pretty much all the supposed issues are solved by taking the second scan a couple months in the future.

I could dump loads of academic research on you about this topic, but it seems like you’re unwilling to engage.

I read most of the research on this topic. And it's all basically "overdiagnosing".

We had the same story about prostate cancer screening: "overdiagnosing", "people die with prostate cancer but not of prostate cancer", blah blah blah. It turned out that simply adjusting the aggressiveness of follow-up was enough to make prostate cancer result in significantly fewer deaths.

From my point of view: MRI is the ONLY tool that can catch things like pancreatic cancer before it's lethal.

Re: Heathrow scraps liquid container limit

#717

Post by KingMob »

grumbelbart2 wrote: post #346
KingMob wrote: post #290

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This kind of thinking is as legitimate as believing lie detectors work, i.e., not at all.

Israel is using those methods in their airport security, quite successfully given their threat level. The problem is that it does not scale well and requires very well trained and attentive personnel.

No. They might believe it works quite well, though, but they're seriously mistaken.

My old neuroscience lab was approached 20 years ago by a three-letter agency looking to develop a rapid reaction time tool to measure the trustworthiness of new people in time-critical hostile situations.

Because of that proposal, I reviewed the literature on "lie" detector tests and their ilk. The evidence is great for them measuring stress, and flimsy for them measuring deception. Normal people get nervous when questioned. Psychopaths may show less autonomic responses. People can train to alter their stress levels. Data interpretation varies wildly by operator, as does accuracy. The only real value is trying to convince criminals they work, in the hopes they make a true mistake or confess.

tl;dr The accuracy is really low, and anyone arguing otherwise is trying to fool the criminals, trying to fool agencies into buying their equipment, or fooling themselves.

Re: Heathrow scraps liquid container limit

#718

Post by 0x3f »

wat10000 wrote: post #707
0x3f wrote: post #694

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You understand that e.g. in Chinese cities they restrict car ownership and you have to enter a lottery/bidding system to get valid plates. Cars are a luxury. European cities have their own restrictions and discouragements. Rationing happens in many ways. I have still never experienced an airport with pick-up/drop-off traffic as bad as JFK, and I've travelled to almost every country in Europe, plenty of countries in A…

That's probably a "JFK is unusually bad" thing, not an "everything is terrible in America and those idiot Americans don't know any better because they never travel" thing. I haven't been driven to JFK since 2001 and I don't remember what it was like then, but driving anywhere around NYC requires great patience.

London is worse _overall_ for traffic than NYC, so I don't think it's that. I like America and Americans, but it's a fact that they don't travel much. JFK is not just bad for drop-off, it's chaos and run-down in general.

Re: Heathrow scraps liquid container limit

#719

Post by brewdad »

ultrahax wrote: post #713
VBprogrammer wrote: post #710

Earlier quoted context omitted.

New York is the worst security I've ever come through for just being needlessly horrible. Like screaming at people because they didn't literally put their feet on the "footprints" on the floor. Toronto was fine. Just a slightly incredulous conversation about how we could take 3 weeks off to travel Canada.

Only time I have ever been shouted at by personnel in an airport was at JFK.

That's just a New Yorker's way of saying "I love you and want you to get home safely".

Re: Heathrow scraps liquid container limit

#720

Post by morpheuskafka »

pavel_lishin wrote: post #673
morpheuskafka wrote: post #498

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Correct. In the US, the TSA is just a government jobs program for the lowly skilled or unskilled. This is oft repeated, but as a federal job, the bar is at least slightly higher than those typical AlliedUniversal/Andy Frain/Etc mall cop guards you see all over the place. I have no doubt that many are incompetent, but I think it is a big unfair that it gets singled out as a "jobs program" given that the bar is on th…

> They are armed despite many of them having an indoor only role Are the outdoors more dangerous?

By outside I mean some of them actually drive around in patrol cars and within their premises would make arrests for any trespass or other crimes. The ones I had the occasion to interact with were just doing badge/visitor approval and baggage screening. A checkpoint officer could of course have the occasion to use force, but so could TSA and they are unarmed and generally do not use force, deferring to local police.
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