Monday, January 12, 2009

TSA Restrictions Now Applicable

Some - how many years? - after the TSA banned the carrying on of any and all liquids in luggage, similar rules have been adopted in The Sandbox. Effective today, "all types of liquids such as water, juice, Pepsi, perfumes, oils, drugs, creams, toothpastes, shampoos, gels, etc. if the package size is in excess of 100 ml" will not be allowed in passenger carry-on luggage. The Ministry of Interior in cooperation with the GACA [General Authority of Civil Aviation] is enforcing the ban in compliance with a decision of the International Civil Aviation Organization... to ensure the safety of passengers.

Passengers have been asked to cooperate "with the inspection teams that will be in charge of using special equipment to check carry-on luggage." Oh my gosh. This is going to be a nightmare for the airport employees. I can just picture the pandemonium this is going to cause. I've blogged before on how I so much dislike having to board a plane from the airport, here, and would rather spend the extra time, money and inconvenience to go to Bahrain to get on a plane. The passengers, here, tend to be unruly and refuse to believe that a "queue" is something they must participate in - getting on a plane requires a lot of "queuing." Getting boarding passes, going through security, getting on the plane... You can stand in a line for an hour to get through security at an airport here and not move a single inch toward being screened because families cut in front from the left and right and not a single official standing in a uniform anywhere will do anything about it. Now you're going to add checking carry-on luggage to this already out of control process? Oh, you poor workers. Women are going to go bonkers if you open their luggage - their husband's will be right there defending them and telling you that you cannot touch anything. I can picture it. It is something you'd have to experience to get the gist of...

"The liquid ban on international flights is part of a series of preventive and precautionary measures to ensure the security and safety of flights in the wake of the emergence of new forms of threats to use some of these banned substances against civil aviation in different parts of the world." Does someone know something that we don't?

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