Mark Curphey – SecurityBuddha.com

(Written at 38,000 ft from the BA277 from Heathrow to Hyderabad, India. I am lucky enough to turn left when I get on a plane and so I bashed this little diatribe out with the help of a few glasses of red wine in my belly.)

It never ceases to amaze me at the false sense of security and warm cozy feeling we all appear to get from airport security.

After checking in on the Internet last night using nothing more than an six character code* sent via email ( for anyone who didn’t already know email is like a postcard; anyone who delivers it can read it) and my surname, I joined the FastTrack security line at the new Heathrow Terminal 5. As the SlowTrack line meandered toward the conveyer belt I removed my belt, watch and shoes and took my laptop from my briefcase. The four trays needed to pass my carry on apparel (1 for laptop (must be alone), 2 for glasses, cell phone and laptop bag, 3 for shoes and sweater and 4 for the carry-on bag)  through the scanner followed a bleached blonde females fake Luis Vuitton handbag,  Mac Book Air and pink cell phone (that her ear seemed to have been attached to five minutes before). She beeped as she walked through the scanner and I smiled smugly. I then heard her telling the minimum wage security guard that she had “body piercings”. After the wand passed again over her boobs and nothing beeped she nodded towards the floor and coyly said “its my front bits”. The blushing guard (female) passed the wand in front of the womans genitals and smiled “ah yeah”. I of course was thinking “prove it”. If you have the balls (sic pun intended) to mutilate your sensitive organs then surely you have the balls to get them out in public? She was ushered on, collected her tacky luggage and waddled off into insignificance like a “Big Brother” star expecting some paparazzi to jump put on her. If you can get your vagina pierced but can’t even say the word in public (I guess technically its a vulva as a vagina is internal but ….) then something is wrong in my book and surely warrants further investigation?

I of course passed without incident, reassembled my travel camel and went to the BA Lounge. When I got to the the lounge I freshened up in what can only be described as a “port-a-loo” inside an airport lounge. In my wash bag was a new pot of moisturizer (that I forgot to take out and put into a clear plastic bag but surely bigger than is allowed) and a sharp razor like blade used to deal with my ailing foot (another story) that I had also forgotten was packed. Lucky (I guess) I didn’t have a Prince Albert or I would have surely been frisked!

As I checked into gate 10b I was behind a “lady” dressed in a Burka. I say “lady” as I could only see her eyes (I am sure my wife who lived in the UAE will correct me that it’s a “hib-something” and not a Burka). Intrigued as to how you check a passport photo when you can’t see the face I watched the other lane as I approached the desk and asked the lady at my desk “How on earth do you check people when you can’t see their face?”. She whispered embarrassingly “we ask them to lift their head dresses” and sighed with a sarcastic look that told me a lot. I wasn’t looking for the sigh or sarcasm; I was genuinely interested in a straight non-judgmental answer. As I joined the queue for the bus (why you need to get a bus to a plane in a brand new airport is beyond me) I turned to see if the lady had been asked to remove her head dress. No, it was a quick visual scan of the passport and then she was ushered to join the queue for the bus.

I get onboard the plane and settle down in seat 3A. Late lunch is served along with the wine that fueled this post. Having recently flown the other way around the world (London > Seattle) house hunting economy I was reminded that in business you get a (chilled) set of metal cutlery. I am sure I just got a plastic knife in baggage class the week before last. Do global terrorists not have a few thousand pounds to upgrade to business class I ponder? I guess not…..

So in summary (and I suspect all terrorists already know this) : Get your bits pierced, wear a Burka and fly business class.

In the meantime for the rest of us I hope the queues and checks continue to give us a warm fuzzy feeling of security.

Fly on!

Warning : This blog was written on board a plan that possibly also served nuts (either definition of the word!).

* Sure its actually not that small a key space but when you consider the amount of people flying and the speed of guessing….

Priceless – http://downlode.org/Etext/alicebob.html

(Hat tip to Dinis Cruz)

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