Banning lighters

[Rollingthunder]

According to the Wall Street Journal, federal security regulators have said that beginning April 14 airline passengers will not longer be able to bring cigarette lighters aboard airlines or beyond security checkpoints. Currently, lighters aren’t allowed in checked baggage and once the new rule goes into effect, passengers will be prohibited from carrying lighters on them or in carry-on luggage – effectively keeping the aircraft lighter free. However, the new rule doesn’t prevent them from bringing matches on board.

[speedbird_heavy]

I can remember being told that a Zippo ligher couldn't be carried on board an aircraft because it contained a flamable liquid....load of nonsense if you ask me.

[BOFH]

This sucks majorly. I own a nice DuPont, and where I go, it goes.

FFS, it doesn't run on thermite!

A Zippo is something else again. I thought they were always frowned upon because they use a volatile agent which isn't positively shut off.

BOFH:\

Oh, right, so I need to bring matches with me to have my pre- and post- flight fags. Who said Americans weren't left-wing?

[Final 3 Greens]

My next door neighbours is an airline captain and I know that his mob have experienced a couple of nasty little accidents with disposable lighters on board.

[419]

I was always lead to believe that Zippo lighters were far safer than disposable ones, due to the fact they were "dual action". You had to flip the top open before you could light it, which isn't the case with throw away lighters.

As for not being allowed on board because they contain flammable liquid!!
Duty Free spirits, perfume etc

It sounds as if it's someone in an office making stupid rules to try and justify his/her job

[Final 3 Greens]

Alcohol and alcohol based perfumes do not carry an integrated source of ignition do they?

Also, I reckon that lighter fuel is flammable to a different order of magnitude.

[The SSK]

It sounds like a bit of US over-reaction to imagined threats, but it's likely to cause non-US airlines and airports a great deal of grief. Even if current screening processes can pick up all lighters in clothing/hand baggage (they probably can't) they are usually positioned such that all passengers go through them, not just US-bound ones. So you then have to ask the passenger where he's going to and confiscate his lighter or not, according to his answer.

So - will the airlines have to conduct another body and luggage search at the gate? (Stand by for very long delays...) And should one of these deadly contraptions slip through the net, what punishment will the US authorities impose on the careless airline which allowed such a terrible thing to happen?

[WHBM]

We must remember that the "security industry" is now a very big and growing industry with its own momentum. There are so many employees there nowadays that there are whole departments just for examining new security rules and proposals.

These departments will not justify their continuing existence unless they are constantly coming up with new rules. Otherwise they will be seen as pointless. So we will see a continuing stream of new restrictions, whether warranted or not, to enable them to continue with their jobs, their pensions, their conferences in resorts, etc.

It's the same with nonsense security scare stories in the media. They know they make good copy in downmarket newspapers, and feed a political and public demand for ever more to be spent on security. Most such stories seem to originate from those who stand to gain either financially or in status from more money being spent on security, whether warranted or not.

[zed3]

desk jockey ..... another security search at the gate ..... already happens at Dusseldorf . PAX go through screening for the pier and then for LTU , Emirates and British Airways at the gate . No real delay as you go through at leisure ( after DF shopping etc. ).

[barry lloyd]

I was given two small plastic lighters by a barman in Singapore in November. One was full, the other half empty. The next day I flew Singapore - Auckland, with a transit in Brisbane. Of course my cabin baggage was screened in Brisbane, and they spotted the lighters. The senior security person (a female), took great delight in relieving me of the full one, saying that I was only allowed one lighter, and spent a lot of time playing with it before finally taking it away to who knows where.
This was my first introduction to Australia...

[candoo]

Zed 3 - think you'll find it's German law to have two checks when flying to and from the UK, saw a sign up at Dortmund inferring as much.

Had the cotton taken out of my Zippo when flew back from Dortmund once.

[patdavies]

It sounds like a bit of US over-reaction to imagined threats, but it's likely to cause non-US airlines and airports a great deal of grief. Even if current screening processes can pick up all lighters in clothing/hand baggage (they probably can't) they are usually positioned such that all passengers go through them, not just US-bound ones. So you then have to ask the passenger where he's going to and confiscate his lighter or not, according to his answer

This is nonsense. It won't cause any problem for non-US airports as TSA only has remit over outbound flights. The TSA has no security search authority outside the USA

The airline is irrelevant since all passengers will be screened by TSA at US airports, regardless of airline/destination.

[The SSK]

This is nonsense. It won't cause any problem for non-US airports as TSA only has remit over outbound flights. The TSA has no security search authority outside the USA Wrong

Congress has voted for a ban on the carriage of butane lighters by passengers. This ban will be implemented by TSA with effect 14 April and will affect all flights operating to, from and within the United States.

This is one of many examples of extra-territorial imposition of security rules by TSA and other US government authorities. Nobody is saying that TSA staff will conduct the searches, only that the airline will be liable for penalties if incoming passengers are found to be in posession of the offending items - hence, they will have to carry out the searches themselves.

[BEagle]

Give up that antisocial and unpleasant addiction known as smoking and you won't need a lighter - so nothing to worry about!

[Self Loading Freight]

What's to be banned next? Piercing eyes, sharp glances, smouldering good looks, pointed remarks and cutting criticism?

R

[angel's boss]

BBC News (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/4438273.stm) Mr Rowell says many readers email him saying they are too scared to complain about security issues.

"How far have we gone as a society where people don't want to air their views on something for fear of ending up on some kind of terrorist watch list?" he added.
The Travel Insider (http://www.thetravelinsider.info/) is yet another crypto-commie-pinko-luvvie-anti-american leaflet, for sure.

[EmergingCyclogenesis]

If you take the top off a lot of lighters you can adjust them so a huge flame comes out and burns off the smokers eyebrows!