TSA Relents After Ten Years

[EV120]

Driving customers away will do 2 things:

1) In short order the carriers and ATA will be screaming for changes as it hits the pocketbook right when they are recovering.
2) Hurts the funding of the DOT and TSA as they no longer can collect taxes and fees imposed on said tickets, that are not purchased.

$$$ or lack thereof can change things quickly. Maybe time to buy Greyhound stock.

 

[Abernathy]

Well I read the article and maybe I missed it but it just says PILOTS... what about the flight attendants too?

Don't push it, chief. I can think of plenty of reasons FAs should still go through security. The logic that applies to us not having to go through does not apply to the FAs.

 

[resetjet]

Sounds like we'll have to wait 'till next year:

http://www.avweb.com/avwebflash/news/airline_pilot_exempt_tsa_security_scanner_pat_203673-1.html

 

[Lowrider717]

Sounds like we'll have to wait 'till next year:

They're just trying to get all us Pilots to shut up and quit stirring up the masses. The fight is still on!

So while you're waiting...consider supporting the cause, the good fight at

www.rutherford.org

And don't forget to tell Michael Roberts thanks for getting the ball rolling...

For Immediate Release: November 19, 2010​

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TSA Agrees to Exempt Pilots from Scanners & Full Body 'Rub-Downs' After Rutherford Institute Files Fourth Amendment Lawsuit


WASHINGTON, DC—Within days of The Rutherford Institute filing a Fourth Amendment lawsuit against the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and Transportation Security Agency (TSA) over its security screening procedures for airline pilots, the TSA has announced that it is amending its policy to exempt pilots from having to submit to either full-body scans or enhanced pat-down searches. In a press release issued today, TSA Administrator John Pistole stated that the agency is immediately modifying security procedures to allow U.S. air carrier pilots to pass through security by showing airline-issued identification and another form of identification. The Rutherford Institute filed a lawsuit on Tues., Nov. 16, on behalf of two airline pilots who refused to submit to airport security screening involving full-body scanners or enhanced pat-down searches, which involve groping of persons’ intimate areas. The Institute’s lawsuit asks the court to prohibit DHS and TSA from continuing to unlawfully use full-body scanners and newly-implemented enhanced pat-down procedures as the first line of airport security screening.
The complaint in Michael Roberts, et al., v. Janet Napolitano, et al. is available at www.rutherford.org.
“Although the TSA’s concession may make it easier for pilots to travel, American passengers will still be subjected to these full-body scans and invasive pat downs in violation of the Fourth Amendment,” said John W. Whitehead, president of The Rutherford Institute. “No American, pilot or passenger, should be forced to undergo a virtual strip search or subjected to such excessive groping of the body as a matter of course in reporting to work or boarding an airplane when there is no suspicion of wrongdoing. To do so violates human dignity and the U.S. Constitution, and goes against every good and decent principle this country was founded upon.”
Collectively, Michael Roberts, a pilot for ExpressJet Airlines, Inc., and Ann Poe, a pilot on the Boeing 777 for Continental Airlines and one of the first 100 women commercial airline pilots in the United States, have more than 50 years of piloting experience and thousands of hours of combined flight time. In two separate incidents taking place on Oct. 15, 2010, and Nov. 4, 2010, respectively, TSA screeners asked Roberts and Poe, who were on their way to work, to submit to full-body scanning or be subjected to a full pat-down frisk of their persons. Upon refusing, both pilots were prevented from passing through security, and unable to report to work on the days in question and since then. The only alternative to the full-body scan, which has been likened to a “virtual strip-search,” is an enhanced pat-down in which a TSA screener presses their “open hands and fingers over most parts of an individual’s body including the breasts, and uses the back of the hands when touching the buttocks. Additionally, officers slide their hands all the way from the inner thigh up to the groin until the hand cannot venture any higher because it is literally stopped by the person’s groin.” The complaint alleges that these procedures amount to an unreasonable search and seizure of airline employees and travelers passing through security. DHS continues to rapidly deploy full-body scanners throughout U.S. airports, with 491 machines to be deployed by December 2010, and an additional 500 machines in 2011. However, a growing number of Americans are voicing concerns about the impact of the scanners on their privacy rights and the risks they pose to travelers’ health.

 

[CX880]

Makes you wonder though. Why now? What did they do to convince them today and not 8 years ago?

 

[sayrejm]

Ok, I concede the flight attendant argument.

 

[B727FA]

AFA has just announced an agreement with TSA to roll out CrewPass for all a/c crews.

 

[great cornholio]

Makes you wonder though. Why now? What did they do to convince them today and not 8 years ago?

My guess is that because we are considered experts at traveling and that if the public sees that we have a problem with these scanners then they think that they should have a problem with them too. So more public may opt out of scanners. If we have crewpass then the TSA can trick the public into saying we just use crewpass so that we speed up security process for both pilots and public by not clogging up the system. This way we shut up and more of the public will start going thru the cancer machines.

 

[rnobson]

So what does this past few days tell us ??? On Wed children's privates just HAD to be rubbed or planes would blow up. On Thursday magically Under 12 is suddenly exempt On Thursday Pilots HAD to be groped On Fri magically they too can pass !!! is this theatre or what ?

 

[WayBack]

Makes you wonder though. Why now? What did they do to convince them today and not 8 years ago?

There were quite a few crew members calling in unfit right after being molested, so that might have something to do with it.
Also, CrewPASS could have been passed long ago if ALPA wasn't like a Government agency and took their sweet time on it. Plus, had they passed it through right away, they would have nothing else to update or talk about in their magazine.