Posted on 07/01/2008 11:56:09 PM PDT by Schnucki
For years at airport security checkpoints, passengers have heard the refrain, almost a dirge: “Laptops must be removed from their cases and placed on the belt.”
Get ready for a change. The Transportation Security Administration has given the go-ahead for passengers to use newly designed carry-on bags that will let them pass through security without having to take their laptops out for the X-ray inspection.
Kip Hawley, the agency’s director, told me Monday that the T.S.A. would accept the new laptop cases as soon as they come on the market.
Two of the biggest luggage manufacturers — Pathfinder Luggage and Targus — say they are rushing to produce the new “checkpoint friendly” laptop cases and expect them to be available by late September or early October.
Two problems with the existing laptop cases are that security officers have difficulty seeing inside them with X-ray equipment, and many of the cases are so crammed with extra gear — power cords, a mouse and the like — that the computer is obscured.
The new cases include either a fold-down section in a bigger briefcase or a stand-alone protective sleeve that contains no extra clutter and can be readily viewed through the scanner.
More than a half-dozen luggage manufacturers, among about 60 that initially responded to a T.S.A. request for proposals about three months ago, have submitted prototypes for testing at checkpoints at three airports: Dulles, outside Washington; Austin-Bergstrom in Texas; and Ontario, near Los Angeles.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
I’ve got a better idea: Kick Terrorist Ass, and forget about these ridiculous airport anal exams.
Exactly. When asked at the ticket counter today to show my idea, I lamented to the girl “I wonder if the goobermint will ever try to solve a problem by giving us MORE freedom, rather than immediately sit down to think what we won’t be allowed to do any more”. She said “Wouldn’t that be nice”
NOTE: As a measure of the extent to which we have become a police state, I had to do some serious editing of the previous paragraph before submitting it.
Gee:
TSA approved luggage locks - for sale now!
TSA approved clear tolietry bags - for sale now!
TSA approved laptop bag - for sale now!
Maybe I’m overly cynical, but it seems like the primary mission of the TSA is to get us to spend more money.
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