How secure do you see airports as being?

[gimmethesimplelife]

After the shooting event (is that what you call it these days?) at the airport in Fort Lauderdale, Florida today, i am just wondering how secure you'all perceive airports to be? Realistically, due to the very nature of travel itself, can much be done to make airports safer? I don't know as I am no security expert but I just wonder what others here think. Rob

[sweetana3]

Just think about it for a minute. If the security zone was around the building, you would still be in as much (minimal) danger outside the building as in the baggage claim area. What about preTSA area in the arrivals. Someone could do the same thing there. If you wanted the whole property to be safe, what about malls, schools, etc. all who have had this type of violence. Only ultimate solution is to ban and destroy all guns. You would still have danger from things like knives, poisonings, cars, etc.

Life is not 100% safe. Millions of people travel safely every month.

ps: I have a good friend on a plane on the runway at Ft. Lauderdale. If she had landed just minutes earlier?

[bae]

Airports bother me a bit Because large portions of them require you to cluster together in crowds with restricted ability to move and react (TSA lines, for instance), and you are not permitted to be reasonably-armed in big parts of airports. And the security is pure theater. It makes airports an attractive target for Bad People because of this, more so when you consider the terror angle from disrupting transportation systems.

One bad actor with an explosive device or nasty hazmat concoction could cause huge havoc in those crowded spaces.

I almost always travel with a firearm in my luggage, but I have to disarm and unload and lock in special luggage, then check it specially, and then hang around the airport unarmed until I board my flight. And until they pass the proposed carry-reciprocity bill, I have to worry about accidentally becoming a felon if my plane is diverted and forced to land in New York or NJ. (The upside of this is that I'm allowed to have effective locks on my luggage, keeping the baggage-handling thieves from stealing my expensive communications gear and whatnot that are usually also in the gun luggage.)

That said, I don't think the risks in airports are particularly worse than any other crowded public space. Especially those spaces which are target-rich zones that disallow tools of self-defense.

[ToomuchStuff]

How many planes were hijacked on 9-11? How many planes have crashed? How many shootings have happened in an airport? What are the odds?

I agree that security is "theater". Those things like toothpaste, water, etc. that they make you dispose of, because the could be hazardous/explosive... Do they take them to a bomb disposal sight and blow them up?
Do they really continuously check peoples vehicles and such that work there? How close can you get to pick someone up from the airport and do they have vehicle restrictions, or do they allow things as large as buses?
If I am a terrorist, do you think I would have qualms about pretending to be someone else and working there, and either trying to bring something in, or use chemicals, etc. to make a bomb on premise. Let alone the thought of killing someone to take their bus and load it with explosives and drive up as close as I can.
UPS/Fedex can still drive up to government buildings, that other people can't park by, due to the OK bombing.

[catherine]

I fly a lot (I'll hit a million lifetime miles in a couple of months) and I am not worried about the security of airports per se. Yes, things can happen. But when I saw yesterday that they are talking about increased security in common areas like ticket counters I shuddered. It's unwieldy enough to get on a plane without adding more layers. I think TSA has its hands full as it is. I would not feel more comfortable with more.

There will always be a way to kill people in public places. No amount of security is going to change that.

[sweetana3]

I don't think TSA should be considered a gun wielding law enforcement agency. They are basically human bomb detection groups and do not provide airport security as far as I know. If someone wanted to do something look at all the other venues available. This was one sick man and he could have done the same thing anywhere there were 10 or more people. We cannot live our lives in fear. As we saw in France, one man and a truck can do as much destruction.

I feel so lucky to live in the USA and refuse to live in fear.

[Teacher Terry]

I don't understand why he was allowed to carry the gun and ammunition? what about just the gun and then the person has to buy the ammunition upon arrival.

[bae]

I don't understand why he was allowed to carry the gun and ammunition? what about just the gun and then the person has to buy the ammunition upon arrival.

You (generally) can't carry the gun and ammunition on your person on the plane.

The general protocol is to check it in your specially-locked-and-inspected luggage. Unloaded.

You retrieve the firearm from baggage claim. Generally an unsecured part of the airport, where any other local could be standing around with a firearm and ammunition legally. So at the point where the bag is claimed, what's the difference?

Why impose a troublesome burden on travellers who need to bring along their firearms, requiring them to locate a local gun store, find ammunition in the proper caliber, and somehow ferret out what the local jurisdiction's regulations on ammunition purchasing are?

[sweetana3]

You are right, anyone can carry a concealed handgun fully loaded into any baggage claim. Nothing was ever done after Sandy Hook, why is this so much more critical?

[jp1]

I fly frequently, not catherine frequently, but frequently enough. Personally I'm not especially worried about airport security. Yes they are often targeted by bad people. And yes they are crowded spaces. But so are schools. And so is the train I take to work every day that I'm not traveling. As has been pointed out, life is dangerous. And there are bad people out there. If someone decides to blow up or shoot up SFO or SAN tomorrow afternoon there's not much I can do about it. The likelihood of that happening is sufficiently small that I choose not to worry about it. If I didn't feel it was I would have to either dedicate a lot of time and miles to driving up and down the west coast (highly impractical and probably statistically much more dangerous than going to airports regularly) or find a new job that didn't include the entire western third of the country as my territory.

And like catherine I dread the idea that getting through the airport could become even more of a tedious, dreadful experience than it already is. Other than figuring out how to get people through security quickly enough that there are somehow never lines snaking back and forth I don't see any way of actually making the airport itself safer.