This is a question I have been posing to myself for a few days now. I'm not sure if there's been a thread on this or an article but I haven't found one yet.

Alot of the stuff we carry including PSK's are great for small airplanes...but what about the major commercial airlines escpecially post 9/11. Surely my leatherman wave and PSK are not making it on board?

If so has anyone designed or has considered what would pass security inspections and yet still allow us the freedom of being personally prepared for any potential survival situation?

For example I would think my Photon Micro III and my mag/flint rod would not spark any arrousal of suspicion? What what about more equipment?

Has anyone thought of preparing for this or perhaps has experienced this yet?

Grayth

Hi grayth,

Yeah, we've discussed it to death! Try doing a search for "air" and "travel" and "security", and other words like that, and you will find some of the threads.

Here are some:
What IS allowed now?
Airline safety and improvisation
air travel and PSK
Air-security acceptable survival kit?
AIRPLANE KIT
Travel and PSKs
Mini kits in air travel

After going all through those threads, plus what I've been encountering, my advice, such as it is, is this:

- If you're going someplace where you'll need a proper PSK, send it via Fedex or DHL in advance.

- While carrying a Personal Survival Kit is problematic on a commercial aircraft, carrying a Personal Medical kit should not be. This means bandages and medications only, no instruments.

- There's no restriction on carrying a flashlight, space blanket or bivy bag, radio, water or certain packaged foods (i.e. Power Bars) on board.

- Take up cigar smoking. Most cigar cutters will pass airport scrutiny and are specifically mentioned on the TSA allowed list. The cheap guillotine cutters can be cannibalized into a fairly usable utility blade in a dire emergency. The cigars can also be cannibalized for emergency medical use as well.

Otherwise forget about any pointed blade or wire.

Here's a story for your perusal. I work in a suit job now where carrying knives etc is frowned on. I still carry a hidden urban kit but a young relative (knowing I llike adventurous travel / expeditions etc) bought me one of those credit card sized mini work - tools. Mine is by BCB:
http://www.bcbin.com/store/comersus_viewItem.asp?idproduct=132
Anyway to cut a long story short, I didn't know where to keep it so I shoved it inside my mobile phone case behind the phone. <img src="images/graemlins/blush.gif" alt="" />The case is leather with a sprung steel clip. Well, I forgot that it was there and I travelled from the UK to Luxembourg by air with the mini-tool with me. This was post 9-11 and the phone was put through the x-ray scanner on its own by the security staff in the UK and Luxembourg coming back. <img src="images/graemlins/shocked.gif" alt="" />I suspect that this was illegal but no-one picked it up. I can only think that the tool was 'lost' in the x-ray as it was sandwiched between the phone and the clip. Its also not knife-shaped. Worrying isn't it?

Why do you find this worrying? You seriously think, post 9-11, that anyone is going to successfully hijack an airliner with a SAK?

As I've repeatedly stated, on this forum and elsewhere, I can buy a much more lethal weapon that in the duty-free shop, inside the security zone. Of course, they won't sell me a broken bottle in the duty-free, but they'll happily sell it to me as a DIY kit <img src="images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" />

So what? A little while ago, some yahoo actually managed to smuggle a pen-knife aboard an El Al flight - and they have some of the tightest security in the world. I doubt the Air Marshals bothered to look up from their crossword puzzles; if they did, it was probably because they were bored. The stewardesses (excuse me, flight attendants) on El Al flights are mostly ex-military with combat training. El Al refuses to confirm or deny (for security reasons) whether their pilots carry guns in the cockpit. El Al pilots enter the cockpit before any passenger is allowed to board and the door remains locked until every passenger has disembarked. For security reasons, El Al refuses to discuss how the pilots eat, drink, or go to the washroom.

More than 30 years before 9-11, Palestinian sympathisers tried to hijack an El Al flight, armed with guns and bombs. One of the flight attendants tried to tackle them and was shot 12 times (but survived). The pilot began violent aerobatic manoeuvres that threw both hijackers to the ceiling with sufficient force to knock one of them unconscious; the other was shot dead by Air Marshals as he tried to get to his feet.

El Al insisted that Captain Bar-Lev acted on his own initiative in throwing the airliner into a 120-mph dive. Maybe that's true, but I'll bet you dollars to doughnuts that every El Al pilot routinely practices anti-hijacking aerobatics in the simulator these days.

The "security" at airports post 9-11 is eye-candy; it's meant to reassure the flying public, but it really adds nothing. The real security lies in the fact that never again will airline passengers allow themselves to be herded to the back of the plane, to be slaughtered like sheep.

The element of surprise is a one-use weapon, except against the terminally stupid. <img src="images/graemlins/mad.gif" alt="" />

Some months ago I ran into three commercial airline pilots while backpacking. I heard, word for word, "airline security is eyecandy." Their main concern was the sloppy oversight for maintenance personnel.

Which is more likely to result in more risk to the aircraft and passengers than a yahoo with a pointed nail file ! <img src="images/graemlins/shocked.gif" alt="" />

What the "allowed list" contains does not matter. Security is not obligated to follow it. Nail clippers, a deadly weapon if I ever saw one, are officially allowed now. In Philly International Airport the signs still read no nail clippers, tweezers, or anything else.

Yet the wine is still being served in glass bottles and if you ask me that's more deadly than a nail clipper...