Failed Detonator Saved Plane, Officials Say
This really was a close call and even though I can't stand the thought of any more seemingly pointless anti-terror flying rules, I suppose it's inevitable:
Officials now say tragedy was only averted on Northwest flight 253 because a makeshift detonator failed to work properly.
Bomb experts say there was more than enough explosive to bring down the Northwest jet, which had nearly 300 people aboard, had the detonator not failed, and the nation's outdated airport screening machines may need to be upgraded.
"We've known for a long time that this is possible," said Richard Clarke, former counterterrorism czar and ABC News consultant, "and that we really have to replace our scanning devices with more modern systems."
Clarke said full body scans were needed, "but they're expensive and they're intrusive. They invade people's privacy."
Al Qaeda, said Clarke, is aware of this vulnerability in the U.S. airport security system. "They know that this is a weakness and an Achilles' heel in our airport security system and this is the second time they've tried it."
consume consume consume consume consume consume consume consume consume consume consume consume consume consume consume consume
You sound consumptive.
Diabolus est Deus Inversus
Let’s just sedate the passengers prior to boarding. It’s a win-win situation for TSA and the Airlines. Passengers can be loaded like cords of wood, either vertically or horizontally on racks, to double, triple or maybe even quadruple the carrying capacity. Inspections of a more intrusive nature can take place without the passengers getting angry. Everyone would use DEPEND® so the three hour max hold time can be reversed and the A/C parked indefinitely on the tarmac. Anyone having an allergic reaction or respiratory arrest could still sue the Airlines, but the with increased passenger miles, insurance would cover the problem easily. And DEPEND® stock would sky rocket.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wMD7Ezp3gWc
Diabolus est Deus Inversus
I'd jump on a JetBlue flight out of Long Beach on a red eye, get all cozy with my blankie and pillow, my JetBlue eye covers and my Bliss lip balm....
A movie or two, some Dog Whisperer, maybe some Rachel Ray....a few Ketle One's on the rocks with some JetBlue chips and cashews and Lorna Doones and 5 hours later I'd raise the blind and there would be the sun and JFK waiting for me.
It was all pretty chill, even with the security getting on.
It just seems to me that a simple deep background check of all passengers who have made reservations would sift out about 99% of the riff raff who want to make it miserable for the rest of us. Let that 1% get taken to a room and patted down, their suitcase combed through with dogs etc.
Oh, and making nice with the rest of the world couldn't hurt. You know. "Blowback" and all that stuff.
"The US has an army of 90,000 soldiers in Afghanistan and is spending $100bn a year, but has still been unable to defeat 20,000-25,000 Taliban who receive no pay at all." - Patrick Cockburn
So, your solution to obnoxious security theater (and that's all the airport screening process is) is to replace it with even more obnoxious and intrusive theater?
Gee, I sure hope there's somebody out there that could provide these new machines for us. I bet they can give us a good price...
Shouldn't these machines be in airports OUTSIDE of the US? What good would they have done in this attack?
That's what I was thinking - was it that airport or was it Delta/Northwest who screwed up?
But hey, maybe manufacturing these scanners will create jobs! Or maybe they'll be made in China...
The real "Achilles' heel" is the mouth breathing TSA flunkie with a superiority complex who cant tell the difference between a soccer Mom and a terrorist.
Hint: Terrorists don't travel with 3 kids. No really.. they don't.
In the near future they will use a soccer Mom as a terrorist
...he uses big words like 'particularly' and 'delicatessen.' -- Jack
a self-professed hockey mom. Draw your own conclusions.
"Trust no one, Mr. Mulder." - Well-Manicured Man
What hurt worse on the way out, the hockey sticks or the blades of the skates?
Diabolus est Deus Inversus
My traveling companion was delayed 15 minutes because she had a BOOK in her carry-on. Jane Austen. The screener (told her) he really could not believe anyone would really read "that stuff", so they examined everything in her carry on.
My husband was almost 'reported' because he was holding a teddy bear on his lap. The stewardess thought that "suspicious"... until she saw him playing with our 2-year-old.
Is not to kill. It's to disrupt. Create a situation where your enemy cannot funnction normally. The longer this goes on, the more damage you do. Eventually, you make them so crazy with fear and paranoia, they destroy themselves. You use their own institutions, like the military, against them. This way, you do more damage than any bomb ever could.
Despite heavy losses, Al-Qaeda and other extremist groups have succeeded in doing just that.
The whole religious complexion of the modern world is due to the absence from Jerusalem of a Lunatic Asylum. -Havelock Ellis
I too do not look forward to increased security at airports; however, since this happened (as did Richard Reid's incident) OUTSIDE the U.S., why would OURS need revamping ? Haven't heard of any domestic flights where there has been trouble like this; these flights originate from OUTSIDE the U.S.
http://www.mlive.com/news/detroit/index.ssf/2...
Saw that in my family's morning paper today. Very bad news.
http://monroenews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?A...
So you saw this guy at the counter, overheard an exchange about getting aboard without a passport, and THOUGHT NOTHING OF IT until the guy turns out to be some terrorist wannabe?
You ever seen any sort of commotion at an international airport? You ever create one?
I'm not trying to be an ass, but seriously, that's a real easy way to end up in a foreign holding tank while your plane flies away.
"Excuse me, but did I hear that man say he didn't have a passport?" is not creating a commotion.
Otherwise, we've got another "I knew it all along" eyewitness, whose confirmation of the suspect's hinkiness comes after-the-fact.
So far the people who've tried to take down the planes have been inept, almost clownish. Why didn't the Nigerian bomber (or shoe bomber) set off his explosives in the lavatory? Why do it where he could be observed and stopped? The plot of the 'liquids bombers' was so stupid it could not have worked.
The only real result of these terrorist attempts is to smother people with more and more "security", to empower the Police State. Maybe that is the goal of AlQueda or whoever is behind these failed efforts. Why actually bomb a building or plane when just trying to do so (or appearing to try) achieve the same results?
Maybe it is time The People stood up and said "No more useless and oppressive Security."
And don't forget the pizza delivery guys who were going to take down an entire military base and the evildoers who were going to blow up an airport pipeline, physically impossible.
These are sting operations which even after they are debunked achieve their intended purpose: To keep the masses in fear and willing to support less liberty and more war.
My thoughts exactly. Who but a completely inept fool would attempt to light his pants on fire in plain view of the entire cabin?
just had the hots for the flight attendant.
AP: Raw Video: Arrest an Another Northwest Flight 25
Democracy is too important to be entrusted to politicians.
Rise Up!
Protest!
It was a plane originating from Nigeria, so it's not unfeasible for there to be quite a number of other Nigerian passengers on board other than our bumbling bomber.
He had food poisoning. Went to the bathroom to throw up. So far as I'm aware, not even the States has made throwing up a terrorist act.
Yet.
If you have to to to bathroom to throw up in the last hour of the flight, you may be prevented and may get into trouble if you go anyway. And even if you spend more than a few minutes in the bathroom at any time during the flight, you may now be viewed with suspicion and even get questioned by the crew. It appears that is what happened today.
Thanks for clarification ..
(Actually I just read an AP story saying the same thing & just returned to this thread to post it! Thanks nonetheless, fellow UU!)
Democracy is too important to be entrusted to politicians.
Rise Up!
Protest!
[Al Qaeda, said Clarke, is aware of this vulnerability in the U.S. airport security system. "They know that this is a weakness and an Achilles' heel in our airport security system and this is the second time they've tried it."]
Oh give me a break. This was an international flight. The TSA doesn't have jurisdiction over the airport where the man got on board. How the hell is this a problem with our security system? It looks to me that Al Queda exploited someone else's security holes, not ours.
US Customs have screeners in international airports for all flights that fly to the US. Apparently "other" screeners aren't good enough!
I don't think "Customs" is supposed to be "security".
The shoe bomber failed miserably, and it's still doubtful his 'bomb' would have worked anyway. This attempt is more indicative of a failing of the security systems in TWO airports, both outside the States, who failed to find potentially harmful chemicals strapped to a guy's leg - TWO. One I might condemn as laxity, or stupidity, or inexperience, or badly paid amateurs, or whatever. But two seems to indicate that there wasn't enough chemicals on the guy to have rang any alarm bells, particularly since one of the security scanners was in the Netherlands, not exactly the most backward of third world nations unable to afford proper machinery or pay their workers a decent wage.
I guess I'm just not willing to buy into the Chicken Little mentality yet again, and again, and again. The detonator didn't go off? Hm. I think I'm going to wait to hear from some expert opinion on explosive devises before I start willingly stripping off my clothes and submitting to a full body cavity search before I get on a plane again.
Can laxatives even be turned into a weapon?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wbDiujuv6rQ
Diabolus est Deus Inversus
Cannot be done on every single person getting on an airplane.
As a Registered Nurse in California I was recently required to go to the police station to submit a set of finger prints to the FBI. This is a good thing to do regardless of any terrorism issues.
There's a front page article in the L.A. Times today about nurses who are felons and are banned from working in, say, Florida. Well, they just make their way to California and elsewhere in order to endanger the public.
It is only because California is being made an example of that the State Board is now demanding more safe-guards.
It seems to me that with a federal base of fingerprints, passport and drivers license I.D.'s that MOST people would be able to board any plane in the world and there would be no problem. MOST people aren't trying to figure out how to blow up a freakin' plane for Chrissakes!
There just has to be a better way of assuring that no one gets on a plane with a bomb etc. I wouldn't even mind being sniffed down by Rin Tin Tin! if it would mean I could chill out on the flight and walk around and use the BR when I feel like it and continue working on my laptop the last hour of the flight!
I really think we don't have the best minds dealing with this situation here....
"The US has an army of 90,000 soldiers in Afghanistan and is spending $100bn a year, but has still been unable to defeat 20,000-25,000 Taliban who receive no pay at all." - Patrick Cockburn
You cannot possibly believe that's a good idea. No actual human being could.
... BUT her idea is a heckuva lot more sound than creating an 'advance screening' list that you can pay a premium fee to join and enjoy expedited screening.
Oppressive security is only for the peons, you see.
*Subject to cavity searches.
Luggage goes on another plane. (Slight additional charge for sending to same destination.)
"Trust no one, Mr. Mulder." - Well-Manicured Man
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qpBrfHyfQa4
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SUOJzYtdTKI
Diabolus est Deus Inversus
!
"Trust no one, Mr. Mulder." - Well-Manicured Man
boy, that's really quite the thing, isn't it?
Here you've got this guy that's been flying all over the place for years despite the fact that he's been watched so closely and then, wonder of wonders, the detonation device just happens to fail?
That just smells way off to me
"Clarke said full body scans were needed, "but they're expensive and they're intrusive. They invade people's privacy.""
I can't stop laughing. The new scaning equipment was the reason just about every airport got millions from the government. Did they use that money for this equiment, No, did the government do anything about the misuse of funds, NO. And here the really funny part there claim they can't get the scans because of Privacy conserns is just plain bullshit.
It's about cost these airports don't want to buy the equipment plain and simple. Instead they will continue to invade our privicy because that nice and cheep.
not that it matters this wasn't a US flight.
Guardian UK: PETN - hard to detect and just 100g can destroy a car
Wikipedia: Pentaerythritol tetranitrate
YouTube: 50g PETN blowing hole in the wall
Democracy is too important to be entrusted to politicians.
Rise Up!
Protest!
works really well on sheeple.
and then couldn't be bothered to finish the job with a functional detonator? It doesn't sound right -- wouldn't they have been in the same catalog?
Maybe that's because the attempted bomber(s) had to improvise. Probably a standard detonator is pretty recognizable, at least to someone whose job it is to recognize such things. So they had to roll their own, reverse engineering a working detonator to create something that still worked but wouldn't be caught.
So although the explosive may be concealable in dangerous amounts, getting it to blow up is not a trivial task. After all, it's a design goal of explosives to go off when desired and not go off otherwise. Thus the engineered detonator to match the engineered explosive.
So this is not a security failure after all, is it? Airport X-Rays (etc) forced the bomber(s) to forgo a reliable detonator for the exotic explosive and bomb sniffing (etc) forced the bomber(s) to use the exotic explosive vs. something that could be easily triggered.
And the additional layers of "security" also functioned: passengers subdued smoldering attempted bomber.
So why bill a success as a failure? Probably gets better headlines and ratings.
Those are good points. We're all so quick to think we were "almost" killed in a terrorist attack. By that rationale, I was almost killed on the way to work in my car several times. Traffic lights, speed limits, and turn signals prevented that.
Maybe you are right and the system actually worked, although not in the black and white way our media expects it to.
The whole religious complexion of the modern world is due to the absence from Jerusalem of a Lunatic Asylum. -Havelock Ellis
I read in a conservative newspaper that the suspect denies being part of a larger group. Why is every news broadcast trying to tie him in with Al Qaeda?
attack Yeman
...he uses big words like 'particularly' and 'delicatessen.' -- Jack
The US, in partnership with the Saudis, is backing the current Yemen government's attempt to subdue the Shia uprising in NorthWest Yemen, reportedly supported by Iran.
Democracy is too important to be entrusted to politicians.
Rise Up!
Protest!
.... grounds for this when suspects in the USS Cole Bombing dug their way out of the maximum security prison and escaped to an adjacent mosque.
But, no, Bush the 43rd told us. Yemen is our ally in the War on Terror. Just like Pakistan.
The good news in this mess is that Al Quaida apparently thinks Detroit is still a worthy target.
Those nut jobs are seriously behind the times, are they not?
like Ben Gurion International Airport in Israel where you are screened before getting inside the airport, at the entrance, once inside, then you get to the security check.
My nephew forgot his ID once and had a secondary screening at the Atlanta airport and it included a body pat down.
...he uses big words like 'particularly' and 'delicatessen.' -- Jack
I have been through Israel and while it is inconvenient, it is secure. They ask you questions right up front and search your carry ons. The other issues is that the Intelligence officials failed. This guy was on a watch list and had a valid visa. He was rejected a new visa for the UK
I'll pass.
Why not just take sensible precautions, and accept that life is dangerous. People are dangerous. Hurtling thru the air miles above the earth in an aluminum tube is dangerous. Put them all together and what do you get? Cracker Jacks!
You must travel first class. What you actually get is about six peanuts in a package that weighs more than the peanuts.
Hasa Diga Eebowai
... the answer is a silly rule requiring you to stay in your seats and sit still for the last hour of the flight.
Because We All Know terrorists have a rule that prevents them from setting off their explosives at any other time than the last 60 minutes of a flight.
And the media is kicking up the same shitstorm as they did with the shoebomber and the liquid-bomber plot, taking the barest glimmer of fact and expounding it into dire predictions and a devastating capability of this global terror network whose threat potential is in and out of season faster than some sports.
If the bomb is STILL BEING ANALYZED, how do we know it's PETN? We don't. It's a guess.
At some point, TSA agents are going to make a really embarrassing and horrid mistake with someone's colostomy bag.
The GOP almost had a merry Christmas.
... a line from the movie, 'Avatar':
"You can't throw a stick in the air around here without it being called terrorism and it being Obama's fault."
...Dick and Liz Cheney are particularly distraught.
BE AFRAID, BE VERY VERY AFRAID!!!!
911 911 911 911 911 911 911 911 911 911 911
TERROR!!!!!
Now take off your shoes, pull down your pants and bend over...
There was a report on 60 Minutes I think last year about how the Feds screwed up these watch and no-fly lists. There are so many mistakes that the whole system needs to be redone yet the DHS wouldn't admit there was a problem.
The one problem they focused on was people with names matching ones on the no-fly list were prevented from flying even though they weren't the exact person on the list.
...he uses big words like 'particularly' and 'delicatessen.' -- Jack
names like Senator Edward Kennedy?
80 grams (100 grams! 1,000 grams! BOOOOOOOM! BWAAAAAH! BE AFRAID!) is just a little over two ounces.
It'd fit inside one of those convenient 'safe' 3 oz. travel bottles.
That's the important limitation.
Another perspective: you've almost certainly got something in your kitchen nearly as powerful in similar masses. Perhaps in innocuous solid form.
But like the alleged explosive, getting the right conditions for explosion is far from a trivial task.
Lots of stuff can explode, getting it to do so under non-ideal circumstances is hard.
http://comics.com/pearls_before_swine/
Diabolus est Deus Inversus
Sorry. I don't believe a word of it.
With security measures today, you can't put explosives through with your luggage, and you can't carry enuf explosive on your person through security without looking like you have a suspicious growth.
Not enuf to bring down a transcontinental airliner anyway.
"Anyone that makes less than $150K in this country, has no business voting Republican."
. . . as you say:
They didn't, did they? You're right to be suspicious. This "failure" -- assuming everything is as we're being told -- was really a success. There is no downed airliner, just a whole bunch of visitors to the US from a particular country now being broad-brushed as mad bombers.
Was this guy working for chenny?
chainey didn't mean to shoot his friend Harry Whittington in the face
He was trying to shoot down a hijacked airliner.
Diabolus est Deus Inversus
you're more likely to be hit by lightning than be a terror victim.
http://www.fivethirtyeight.com/2009/12/odds-o...
The problem in both this case and the "shoe bomber" case was with the airports from which they departed.
It doesn't matter how much security we have on this end, if the passengers and bombers-to-be are able to get on to planes coming into the US undetected.
Given that many nations that have direct flights to the US aren't particularly fond of the US, or have a somewhat relaxed attitude to security, there's no way to prevent this sort of attack.
... that Obama would be tested within a year? Was it Biden?
If you need funds to pay for essentials, you have a revenue problem
If you need funds to pay for frivolity, you have a spending problem
the Amsterdam airport where this Nigerian with a bomb allegedly taped to his leg and links to al Qaeda boarded a plane to Detroit.
http://www.ictseurope.com/about/subsidiaries....
Better luck next time.
...of the puzzle perhaps?
copy/paste) "A Michigan man who was aboard Northwest Airlines Flight 253 says he witnessed Umar Farouk Abdul Mutallab trying to board the plane in Amsterdam without a passport."
http://www.mlive.com/news/detroit/index.ssf/2...
audit-prosecute-incarcerate
Somebody else was with him, escorted him through security and talked them into allowing him aboard without a passport. Tell me this doesn't sound like a set-up! There probably never was a working detonator.
"Courtesy is owed. Respect is earned. Love is given." --Unknown author, found in Guide to Texas Etiquette by Kinky Friedman
Ha ha ha. A well-dressed man foiled world security.
Perhaps if they could prevent terrorists' access to haberdashers...
"If the US government enforced its banking laws like it did its park regulations, we wouldn't be
in this damn park in the first place." OCCUPY.!!
Maybe instead habertrotters?
Diabolus est Deus Inversus
kind of. But what's with the targeting of just airplanes?
till they just give up and the airlines become the next casualty of the U.S. Economic meltdown. Taking down stock markets with it and stuff.
taking down the U.S. economy has always been Al Whoevers goal.
That makes sense. Shutting down air travel would have a big impact on things.
We can't have a healthy Country and economy if people are afraid, frustrated, uncertain about the future, and are not spending or investing in any thing.
That's the thing. They can have the tightest security ever, naked and shackled passengers, whatever, but it's also easy to target a bus, or train, or subway, or shopping mall.
The only difference with a plane is it has now been shown it can be used as a missile.
I give up... ?
"If the US government enforced its banking laws like it did its park regulations, we wouldn't be
in this damn park in the first place." OCCUPY.!!
They're guaranteed to hit all the world news and trigger insane over-reactions even if they fail. Why the hell not?
This bomber was coming to the US from overseas. We WEREN'T INVOLVED IN SCREENING HIM.
and these new rules are just to harass innocent people. Damnit. We have Constitutional protections against illegal search and seizures. Yes, airlines are private companies, but they are under heavy Federal regulation, and the security/TSA is Federalized.
There's no reason at all to prevent people from going to the bathroom. There's no reason to tell them they can't have something in your lap. Who came up with this nonsense?
I'm so sick of overreaching authority and civilians all too happy to make themselves miserable for security theater. Didn't we vote for change a year ago? What happened to that?
but this Administration keeps moving further towards the right and distancing themselves from the left and that wasn't exactly the change people had in mind.
at the rate things are going we won't have any rights left.
Authority will call all the shots. Total Global Corporate Dominance.
will take away our rights...so the terrorists don't have to!
NOBODY 2012
Read the eyewitness account from a passenger on the plane:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/roey-rosenblith...
Security was strict. Passengers were personally interviewed by security screeners. The author of the above article was thoroughly frisked.
It looks very much like the flight with the bomber on it was subject to far tighter security than what is typical in the USA. And still the deluded asshole got his bomb aboard.
for a novel I was researching. He told me something that I always kinda sorta suspected was true: If you can see the security, it's not real. That's just window dressing to make you feel safe/paranoid. The real security is going on behind the scenes, where the public never sees it.
So I'm hardly going to castigate whoever on the ground missed this guy with a bottle of whatever it was strapped to his fruits-n-nuts. Someone behind the scenes, where the real security lies, f*cked up. But then, that hardly surprises me these days, either.
of security guard who likes frisking the passenger's courting tackle you probably shouldn't have the job.
Hasa Diga Eebowai
I think everyone should bear in mind two things:
1. The success or failure of a particular attempted attack has no effect on the success of a subsequent attempt. The shoe bomber, for instance, raises concerns not because of the severity of his own action, but because it revealed a previously unanticipated means to carry out an attack. Are we really suggesting that TSA should do nothing in response simply because the bomber failed this time? Just in terms of liability, that's a preposterous suggestion. (Bear in mind, I'm assuming the plan is viable, as with the firework explosion in Detroit)
2. International travellers have to go through U.S. Customs on each end of the flight (I can't say if this is true for all countries, though - just my experience from travelling in Europe and the Americas).
We've witnessed reactions that are disproportionate to various threats. I certainly wouldn't suggest otherwise. But sometimes, concern and even fear are appropriate responses. The key is make sure that fear is leavened with reason.
They should do nothing in response because they are fundamentally incapable of doing anything productive.
Things I wonder about:
1. Does there exist a security system and procedures that would guarantee a real and significant improvement in our air traffic safety?
2. Would we as a people and as airline customers be willing to put up with the costs, invasion of privacy, inconvenience, etc that might be required of such a system?
I Don't know the answer. I am coming to believe that we may have to learn to live in a dangerous world with limited safety like so many other counties. Perhaps the age of the "Volvo Mentality" is over. The continental US had two centuries of being protected by two oceans. Except for our own Civil War we have always fought "over there" and win or lose came home to whole families and a functioning country not ravaged by war. This alone made America exceptional in the world. Perhaps this is why it is so hard for we Americans to accept what seems to be our current reality of vulnerability. Perhaps this is why we have evolved enough to identify with the pain and hardships of our soldiers but not the foreign homes and civilians that daily are "unintentionally" blown to bits by our military.
1) No. Only two things have happened since 9/11 that have materially improved air safety: reinforcement of cockpit doors and the new willingness of passengers to fight back. All else is security theater. You are being abused by the TSA, at your own expense, for no productive purpose.
... like a Bruce Schneier reader. I approve.
homeland security and their equally inept tub stacking army the tsa are worse than worthless in preventing terrorist attacks such as these because their ineffectual attempts at security measures are little more than public posturing bordering on buffoonery. they end up projecting a false sense of security, while doing little more than confiscating nail clippers, or denying people restroom facilities in the last hour of a flight.
these morons had the perpetrator on a terrorist watch list, however didn't have him on the no fly list. if these twits had done their jobs correctly, he'd never been allowed to board the plane in the first place.
A person must be feeling hopeless and desperate to do something like this.
This 23-year-old jihadist was a rich brat from a very privileged background.
"Hopeless and desperate"? He may have been desperate to light his bomb, but there was nothing hopeless about him.
Thanks to his incompetence, his would-be victims got to walk away. This bozo deserves no one's sympathy.
detonator tester!
Let this be a lesson to all terrorists...(test all detonators before boarding)
audit-prosecute-incarcerate
don't forget to add vindictive though, and also the belief that he is a Martyr. The US MSM is crazy for an airplane or balloon story so they're an obvious target for martyrs to get maximal media coverage for their fifteen minutes of religio-political fame.
"Government by organized money is just as dangerous as Government by organized mob"
-= Franklin Delano Roosevelt =-
This incident makes me wonder about Al Queda.
Almost 10 years after 9/11, and they're still trying to blow up planes? Don't they have better things to do? Other targets? Different strategies?
I mean, you can kill a lot of people if you manage to take down an airliner, but WTF?
Is this all "Jihad" means - blowing up planes?
I doubt we're told much of the story. These airplane plots make for good news, and the public cries for more "police", more "security".
"If the US government enforced its banking laws like it did its park regulations, we wouldn't be
in this damn park in the first place." OCCUPY.!!
It's the tail wagging the dog.
It doesn't add up, not that the media asks its, presumably official, sources even the most basic questions to get a story that does make sense.
We're told that this person had 80g of PETN, which is supposedly enough to have blown up the plane. Maybe that's so, maybe 80g would be enough if shaped properly and applied to a specific place on the aircraft's hull. But would that amount suffice if still strapped to the guy's thigh?
We're told there was a detonator failure. How's that? Wouldn't the detonator be the easy part of the device, a part that could have been tested and retested before its actual use to make sure it was reliable.
I don't recall any of the witnesses mentioning anything like a detonator. They all mention this syringe, melted by the fire by the time they saw it. Would you detonate PETN by injecting a liquid into it? I've never heard of such a thing, but as above, if this liquid was the detonator, you'ld think they would have tested it for reliability.
What both the last-minute injection of a liquid, plus the result, an incendiary effect rather than an explosion, suggest, is that they were trying instead for a binary munition, something that wouldn't be an explosive until you mixed at least two ingredients together at the last minute. Presumably they would do this, rather than just smuggle a finished product explosive on board, for one or both of two reasons: avoiding explosive sniffers, and avoiding carrying around something unstably explosive until the moment you wanted it to explode. But, obviously, the downside of that strategy is that with that last, field expedient, step in the production, you don't get a reliably pure or finished explosive, you get instead something that's just an incendiary.
Of course, yes, it's possible that they really just wanted an incendiary, something that would start an uncontrollable fire, and bring down the plane that way. But there's the matter of the official claim about 80g of PETN, which is not an incendiary.
The story doesn't add up. The dots don't connect, at least for the official story of a near miss terrorist event. It still looks mostly like a lunatic amateur, right down to the concerned relatives trying to head him off.
is plenty to blow out the cabin and that would be sufficient to take the plane down barring a miracle.
Hasa Diga Eebowai
Only if he was near a major structural member, control linkage, or fuel line. Modern jet aircraft can survive an amazing amount of structural damage if it doesn't impact a critical system.
The structure is strong enough in places to survive a sizable chunk of the metal ribs being blown out.
The only sufficiently major structural member that passes anywhere near the passenger seats is the main wing spar... and he would have had to be right over it to compromise it. Airplane structures are remarkably redundant.
This person, by all witness accounts, intended to detonate the explosive in his lap, not applied anywhere else. It would probably take a lot more than 80g of PETN to blow out the fuselage that way, simply as an air blast at a random place within the cabin.
It's true that as little as 80g of PETN, as det cord, can perform impressive feats, say blowing a tree or telephone pole in two. But it will do that only if shaped properly for the job. You wrap several coils on top of each other around the tree trunk, so that when it's detonated, the force of the outer coils exploding forces the blast of the inner coils into the tree, rather than harmlessly into the air, thus cutting it at the circumference where the coils lay. If you took the same amount of det cord, but just stuck it to the tree wrapped into a ball, or worse, made a ball of it and detonated that ball a few feet from the tree trunk, you wouldn't do any damage to the tree at all beyond some very superficial blast burn.
"we really have to replace our scanning devices with more modern systems."
Why the hell wasn't some Stimulas money used on national security?
Probably because those pesky Fiscal Conservatives wanted the money in tax breaks so it never leaves their pockets. Greedy bastards those Republicans...
including explosive trace detection, bottled liquid scanners, advanced body imaging units, baggage handling, and closed circuit tv. http://thegovmonitor.com/world_news/united_st...
Number of Republican votes in Congress for the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, a/k/a the Stimulus Bill: 3 in the Senate, and zero in the House of Representatives.
What about all the $$ we've poured into "Homeland Security" since 9/11. Why hasn't this been addressed already? Why are checked bags STILL not screened for explosives?
New Flight Rules:
1. All passengers must wear see-through gowns. Their original clothing will be returned to them at the conclusion of the fight and after the second strip search.
2. All passengers will be strip searched.
3. Any passenger with more than the legal amount of toothpaste, lotion or shampoo will be shot on sight.
4. Don't even think about using the bathroom. You hold it until you get to your destination.
5. Bag fees are now $200. What you think that's extreme? Then clearly you don't care about safety and/or freedom. You, sir/madam, are unAmerican. No checks.
NOBODY 2012
Seems to me this guy got on the plane in Nigeria & then again in Holland. Doesn't seem like a lack of security here in the US.
It's not all or nothing.
Didn't the pilgrims come from Holland?
Diabolus est Deus Inversus
And they brought their successful windmill technology with them.
"Anyone that makes less than $150K in this country, has no business voting Republican."
I have two posts to offer, by two men who had some mathematical- and science-based insight to provide, respectively:
Firstly, Canadian rocker and political activist Matthew Good's "Science Can Be a Bit of a Bitch," detailing the odd incongruities in the story presented by the media. Good has many questions, the most specific being "why the heat generated that burned him did not result in the autoignition of the substance," considering that its autoignition temperature is 190 degrees Celsius.
Secondly, infamous blogger and statistician Nate Silver once again puts this all into perspective with "The Odds of Airborne Terror." After all, it is difficult to argue with these kinds of revelations: "Dividing by six, we get one terrorist incident per 16,553,385 departures." How much danger do you really feel as though you are in?
Matthew Good needs to dig a little deeper than the Wikipedia page on PETN. The autoignition temperature is the temperature at which the material will start to burn, not the temperature at which it will detonate. Second, initiating detonation in a small sample of a military explosive (like PETN) requires both heat and shock -- combustion provides only heat. Now, combustion to detonation transition can occur in PETN, but it requires a much longer length than any reports of what this guy had.
Well, good to know. (I have to be honest: one of the reasons I posted the link was to see if anyone had alternate information to provide. It is appreciated!)
He's off more than an order of magnitude about the quantity PETN reported, which is only 0.08kg.
But that still doesn't make the official story of a barely foiled plot credible. What liquid do you inject into your 80g of PETN to get it to detonate? That's the part that has me confused. I mean, if the liquid was something flammable, and this person lit it with a match in the false belief, arrived at because he visited the same web page as Good, that attaining a temp of 190 would set off an explosion, what you would have to say about that is that he doesn't know how to use explosives, and didn't bother to test out his plan to make sure it would work, before committing himself to starting a fire in his lap in the actual attempt. Not what I would call a serious attempt, barely foiled. The official story says that the attempt was foiled only because the detonator didn't work. But if the detonator couldn't work, under any conditions, because it was based on faulty ideas about detonating PETN, we're basically dealing with a mentally unbalanced person, not a dangerous terrorist.
Hmmm...must've been made in America...
Diabolus est Deus Inversus
it would have been a tragic act and I hate to sound heartless, but look at how many people die on the highways of America or how many choose death by smoking. Then look at how little of a frenzy that causes. The media frenzy is intended to keep us scared, to keep the war machine rolling.
I believe we would be successful treating terrorism as a criminal matter. This whack-a-mole game we are playing with the terrorists is intended to keep us pouring money into 3rd world shit-holes.
Dammit. I'm not the smartest guy on the planet but I can see this plain as day. Why can't our government? Are they THAT bought off?
I really miss Japan.
"Better." It's what we should ask of ourselves and of our leaders.
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