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="" />