Oggin,
Your last post hits the nail on the head there fella
These banal rules, that are oft quoted as a defence by those so short sighted, fail to take stock of the big picture
We have a system that is based on it's civvie equivalent and bears absolutely no relevance to what we in the militarty get up to on a day to day basis. We emplane, on the whole, military people who are going about there miltary business around the world. They are simply carrying items they would normally utilise in their day to day environment and bearing in mind we, despite the ever increasing "touchy feely EO" service we live in, do not currently employ muslim fundamentalists or members of any other such terror groups I fail to see what the problem is.
No doubt some one from the mover fraternity will now tell us that this excellant rule is in place to stop a passenger running amok and damaging the aircraft or others on board
b@@l@cks
Firstly when did that last happen.
Secondly there are enough other items in the back of our AT fleet, chains - tensioners - fire extinguishers - DAC..............f@ck me Albert has two fire axes completly exposed to anyone who wishes to wield one in anger so the danger posed by a gerber or aircrew knife pales into complete insignificance.
I would suggest that if Mr C and the like really thought this was a rule that could be dispensed with, then bearing the amount of times the JSP 335 is changed to make it easier for movers to load all and sundry aboard our AT fleet, they would get it changed.
However ask yourself why they dont.....................
all spelling mistakes are "df" alcohol induced