Knives on aircraft

[Seloco]

I passed (as a pax) through one of Europe's largest hubs last night.

Check-in and security were right up to scratch in terms of ensuring that I had nothing sharp or untoward in my hand luggage or on my person.

HOWEVER
On reaching airside I went to the foodcourt for a snack before boarding, and was rather surprised to see vast quantities of sharp, serrated metal knives laid out for all and sundry to take, presumably to carve through the pizzas, etc. on sale there.

Since there was no other security check before I boarded my flight to London, I am idly wondering just what stops someone so inclined getting on board with a pocketful of potential weaponry?

Or aren't airlines/airports concerned about the "sharps" thing any more?

[flyguykorea]

You will find that quite a number of airlines have now returned to using metal cutlery. Guess the crappy plastic could only last for so long in First and Business...

[Seloco]

True, FGK, but only on certain routes. When I fly LHR-SIN on SQ for instance, it is plastic, but onwards from SIN-MNL it's back to metal. Apparently it is the airports/routes rather than the airlines that have been defining this, and I thought that LHR was definitely still a "plastic" place, but maybe things have now moved on.

[Rollingthunder]

Is it possible to re-direct this whole thing to airliners.net.somthing?

[Seloco]

RollingT:
I don't think that this topic is aircraft specific, somehow!

[Random Electron]

Are Swiss Army knives still being sold airside at Geneva and Zurich airports?

I read they were, even post 9/11.

[Noax2grind2]

Interestingly enough I passed through GVA recently and the pax in front had a pair of thin hair trimming scissors.
The security person took them and measured them against some scale hidden from view, and handed them back!!
Makes a bit of a mockery of the piles of nail clippers in some airports closer to home!!

[sammypilot]

As any Prison Officer can tell you, almost anything can be converted to a weapon. We have gone way over the top particularly when confiscating items such as nail clippers and nail files. You just have to accept that there is no total prevention if a terrorist is determined enough - and they are!

[jtstream]

IMHO I think that plastic knives are in some way more dangerous than the iron one.
Just try to break one of the plastic ones and compare the sharp edges to the blade of the iron knives...