This is phenomenal in the truest sense of the word.

It is almost as if all the brow beaten, censored, anti-American labeled, restricted, genuinely concerned, straight talking Ppruners have come out of the closet at one time. What a time to do it!

The beauty of it is, that many are all taking a lead from Danny's posting relating to the idiocy of the situation relating to the current Transatlantic Aviation fiasco. For once, leader and led are in accord, when USA saber rattling is the issue.

When there was two superpowers things were dangerous, now that we have only one we are in greater peril.

With someone like W at the helm, pity help us.

Who the f*** wants to go to the good ole usof a anyway ,to be met by the most pig ignorant,bad mannered,gum chewing
ars*****s you have ever met,ie immigration.
i was there recently and the first thing l did was rip off the american flag sticker on the hire car.****### and as for congregating,why not pi** on the cabin floor,particularly if it is an
american airline

Eh, Lets not go too far Frangatang.

Sticking to the side of coherency is oft best !! :uhoh:

This situation seems to be getting quite out of control.
If I was an airline exec concerned about operating security and operational dependability in these whacko times - I would consider banning all Muslims from air travel on my aircraft. "We reserve the right to refuse service to anyone." End of problem? Activate lawyers to handle massive complaints. At the bottom line the threats are only from some members of the Islamic religion. Eliminate the possibilities. Fly in a bit more peace? To hell with being PC.

Well, Yank bashing is a time honored tradition here on PPRuNe. I couldn't imagine many of these hostile comments tolerated if directed to, say, Israel (which has flown into the UK with sky marshals for many years).

We are so blessed in America that I can see where some would be jealous and insecure.

Sure looks like a lot of single digit posters here suddenly <g>.

Blessed with what exactly ?

http://www.click-smilies.de/sammlung...smiley-011.gif



And what do you do with your single digit when not using it to type such literary masterpieces Airblubba ?

Loo-time
 

Hi,

I saw this restrictive action on JetBlue in October. They only seemed concerned with the forward loo though...

I can imagine on longer flights with higher pax loads then there would be quite a rush to get the next loo slot.

Perhaps they will rename as JetBLoo?

Jim

Airbubba,

Whilst I accept that a lot of the postings here constitute nothing more than ugly rhetoric and contribute little to the debate, they are indictive of a creeping unease with the "big brother" attitude which is seeping slowly, but surely from your side of the pond.

The USA has been without a doubt, a great nation.

We are not witnessing its finest hour.

Do you think perhaps it might be possible to restrict this thread to a discussion of the merits vs crass stupidity of this particular "congregation" rule and the way it's being enforced?

Does this have to become a general debate about whether the US is "blessed" or "arrogant"?

The point is 'Bubba that the several other countries like Israel that have had serious security problems over the years have handled it internally to the airlines their countries. They handled it quietly and effectively.

Very rarely have they run rough-shod over sovereignty issues and swaggered around demanding pointless actions by others.

When a foreign airline is outside of American airspace I would suggest that they continue to operate under the jurisdiction of the country of registration. Anything else is hegemony of the creeping kind.

And if you don't like it and ban us from your airspace then fine, we shall stop buying US Treasuries and you can paper the bathroom with your Reichmark-like dollars. This way trade wars commence.

fine, if countries like israel want to put sky marshalls on their own aircraft, that is their OWN decision. Who the hell does W think he is telling other democratic nations what they should be doing. It was pointed out before the elections that he had next to no knowledge of foreign relations and now he's proven it. I don't want to bash on yanks but like it was said earlier if security was a priority before 9/11 then we wouldn't be in the mess we're now in. I remember flying from miami to europe in 99 on a domestic flight linking to an international flight, and my hand luggage wasn't x rayed once. i never walked through a security scanner and i didn't even have to pass customs. As far as i know the USA think i'm still there.

Coming back from Atlanta with Delta last week, we had the "non congregating " announcement,from the Captain and he was very definate in asking passengers to only use the toilets in their section of the cabin, and not to leave their section.

He was ignored as he was when he put the seat belt signs on during the flight.

When you have kids they go when they have to go. There was no implementation from the cabin crew and I would swear that the long queues developing in my section were reduced using the bogs elsewhere.

People are not that quick in the bogs.

Funnily the filght was composed of predominately British passengers (judging by the few landing cards handed out) so maybe they were not too bothered.

I was bothered with a brown skinned man who boarded the plane with no hand luggage at all, spent the flight saying prayers and sweating. He was in the row in front of me and I swear if he had moved I would have been on his back in a flash. He scared the **** out of me.

So much so that I seriously considered asking to be let off the plane.

On arrival at Gatwick, he seemed to be having difficulty about what he should do with his blue passport. Last I saw of him was him slipping into the bogs as I went through passport control.

Maybe he was nervous because he was going to claim asylum of something. But hell it was scary.

No more flying by me to the US; the place is definately off limits for the forseeable future.
Mind you the scariest people in the world are the jerks who broadcast on talk radio. People like Rush Limburgh. These guys claim to be conservative but they are out and out fascists. Real wackos.

I will go somewhere safe like South Africa or Afganistan for my next holidays.

chrisbl

Wino

OK, you clearly have no intention of answering any of the points made regarding this nonsensical policy. You prefer to sit smugly and allude to all this top-secret information that only you possess, that you accuse our government(s) or employers of witholding from us.

Of course there is nothing stopping you from logging on with an anonymous email and PPRuNe username with whatever info is pertinent. I think the reality is more likely to be that there is no such information, or that you are less interested in our safety than your own self-importance. I hope the latter is not true.

Whatever the case, the policy that seems to be emerging in the UK makes the most sense- if there is any credible threat, don't fly. To do anything else is taking liberties with the safety of the travelling public. If there is no credible threat, congregation is irrelevant. If congregation is an issue, then ipso facto there is a threat.

I have to travel to the US later in the month, sadly. Not "sadly" because of the country- I thoroughly enjoy my time there- but because of this nonsense. I tend to wander about as much of the cabin as I can, partly for my own health, partly to relieve the boredom. I will continue to do so unless physically restrained.

It's a pity you can't answer the points made against your governments policy- it would allow us to respect you a little. Only to be expected I suppose.

Airbubba

The only way in which the USA is number one is in the number of weapons you possess. In every other way you have no claim to that position. Culturally, ethically, politically and socially, you lag behind other countries.

The current nonsense is making China seem like a better alternative as world leader. Your arrogance may not have allowed you to learn at school that every dynasty has its day, and usually a hegemony fails when it become over-obsessed with it's own greatness. Ask any Roman...

WARNING!

Some very puny willies being waved very vigorously here! :rolleyes:

Whilst some of the comments are amusing, especially the indignantly outraged ones, can we please try and leave the debate on the topic of the diktat that we have to announce to to our pax that they mustn't congregate around the loo on flights to the USA. Resorting to generalisations regarding Americans and their government only leads to a flame war. Moderating these threads is becoming a chore which is not good for the rest you... trust me! :E

What we are discussing here is the nonsense and futility of such 'buttock insulating' orders from our cousins on the west side of the Atlantic. We can appreciate where some of their paranoia stems from but we here on this side of the pond have had to deal with aircraft terrorism for a generation and it is becoming increasingly apparent that there is a huge hint of 'arse covering' just in case they have got it all wrong.

I have never seen any intelligence service worth its salt go so public on what they claim to be 'credible evidence' and come up with nothing except decrees and diktats that appear to the rest of us over here as giving in to the terrorists' desire to instill fear deep enough to change the way we go about our daily lives (in this context, aviation). If they really had credible evidence then they would act on it as covertly as possible. The intelligence services know that their jobs are thankless when they succeed and thankless when they don't succeed.

Why all this flailing, overt activity in the full glare of 24 hour media publicity? All the US appear to be doing is giving the terrorists what they want... the world sees a nation almost paralyzed with paranoia and fear.

We know that our next thread will be the new entry regulations coming into force for visitors to the US. Photographing and fingerprinting of every entrant to the US will give some people the 'warm and fuzzy' feeling that something serious is being done. However, considering it is only planned to be implemented at about 30 airports and does not cover the other 95% of locations where visitors can enter the USA, just what is the point?

Stagger,

The rule against congregation has more to do with keeping the flight attendants alert and GIVING THEM A TOOL to do something about something that might make them feel uneasy.

Most of the time they will blow it off, but should suddenly a bunch of well tanned fit looking men congregate there and for some reason it makes them feel uneasy, they have the force of law behind them, up to and including a diversion and law enforcement personell coming on board. By having it as a rule, should there be a problem there is actually a chargeable crime which can be used to hold the people in question while the problem is sorted...

MOR,
I do go out occasionally so I can't always respond quickly.
If I were to post something sensative on the site Danny would be obliged to immediately delete it, so what would be the point? If I Posted it under another name you wouldn't believe it, or else would know it is me. If the Gov't reacted quickly enough there is no way I could hide from them. If you think your 3 letter name protects you here you are deluding yourself. If you think it would be wise to post every little detail of a constanstly evolving response to an ongoing problem you are criminally dangerous to aviation in general, and quite possibly an agent of Al Queda....

However, many people here know who I am and have seen me face to face in and out of uniform...

I am amazed at howmany people have come out of the woodwork to protest with their first or second posts. Not too much credibility there...

Cheers
Wino

Once again, trust me when I say this but it is because of the apparent naivety and paucity of coherent thought that has probably gone into the diktat in the first place. :hmm:

While I might be willing to agree with that Danny, the numbers from established posters here is far less overwhelming... For all we know it could be one busy little bee....

No one worries too much on a charter flight because it is almost always a sell out. But on an early morning flight or late night flight (Sometimes the most profitable inspite of by far the lightest loads because of heavy business travel and priority parcel services) its possible to get on a widebody with only and handfull of people... Then a group of people congregating in the LAVS has to be looked at a little differently than it would be otherwise.

One would count on the good judgement of the Flight Attendants in raising a stink, but really what's the big deal about making a PA? Why throw away any arrow from your quiver, no matter how small?

I would say that we see most of these memo's closer to the source than you do when it goes through a second government and a whole second FAA/CAA beurocracy and they may be more rational in their original form then in the manner in which they percolate through each successive government... Doesn't mean I agree with all of em by a long shot, but I think much of the problems has to do with things be lost in the translation. Hell that may be the intention, to screw em up by some petty Beaurocrat that had his territory userped...


Cheers
Wino

Believe me that the IP addresses are checked for the 'source' of multiple posts from newly registered users. In this case, it is probably due to the overwhelming sense of outrage at the apparently ill thought out pronouncements coming from your side of the pond.

We are allies but this doesn't mean that your friends can't think for themselves from much longer experience on how to handle airport and aircraft security.

Agree with that, but you are also seeing the consequences of past attrocities.

In the aftermath of Lockerbie and 9/11 as well as other acts of terrorism there was inevitably a congressional hearing on the affair and always there was some low level unconnected warning somewhere that with 20/20 hindsite was real easy to point to and say "WHY WASN"T ANYTHING DONE?" You know, a travel advisory etc that made to gov't employees but not the general public.

So the Hew and cry was atleast tell us about the alerts and let us decide for ourselves. Well now you get to hear about every piddly alert and make your own decisions. On this side of the pond it hasn't seamed to effect travel one iota, this has been going on for a month and daily traffic numbers for AA are WAY up over last year... But on your side of the pond the reaction seams to have been somewhat different...

Cheers
Wino

>>I will go somewhere safe like South Africa or Afganistan for my next holidays.<<

And please, take four more with you <g>...

We've had similar hand wringing threads here about locked cockpit doors, whether to support Saddam, and keeping granny off the cockpit jumpseat. In each case the UK eventually came around to the U.S. point of view after all the dire predictions of the end of the world as we know it. We certainly comply with your regs when coming into LHR.

As always, we appreciate your loyal support and enjoy the debate.