All the recent airport security nonsense reminds me of an experience a few years back. I was in Seattle Airport, waiting at the gate for my time to board.
At next gate there was a couple sitting there, all by themselves. The door to the gate was open, and there was no one outside anymore, other than the couple. Clearly everyone had boarded, but for some reason the couple didn’t. Even more oddly, the plane seems to be waiting for them.
The airport was rather empty, and it’s at least an hour before my time to board (yes, I am one of those who tends to go to the airport hours prior to boarding). Other than a handful of travelers strolling by, not much was going on.
The couple sat there by themselves, seemed to be waiting for something. They laughed and joked, but also clearly somewhat impatient at whatever they were waiting for.
About 15-20 min later, a flight attendant walked over with a security guard following closely behind, marching directly towards the couple. The couple saw them and stood up, and a bag search of the girl’s carry-on luggage began.
As it turned out, somehow, when the couple passed the security check point, something happened and the girl’s passport was supposed to be marked as ‘luggage checked’ but never did. This marked her as somehow snuck through the security checkpoint. As a result, the flight attendant could not let her get on the plane and had to go get the security guard to perform bag check before she’s allowed to board.
5 minutes later, the bag check was completed and the couple was let through the gate. The gate door closed and the plane took off.
There are so much one can talk about here. For example:
- How did the girl get through security gate without being marked accordingly?
- Why would they make the entire plane of passengers wait there for 20 mins while a couple getting their bag checked?
- How odd that they went and fetch the security guard to the gate to perform the bag check. I would have expected that they would send the couple back to security checkpoint.
- How could they leave the gate door open, unguarded, for 20 min?
- and more….
but the thing that completely threw me off was: they did not check HIS bag!!!!!!
The couple was left at the gate entrance, all by themselves, for almost 20min without any supervision. That was plenty of time for her to move her stuff over to his bag. The dude had a huge duffle bag with him. If there were any dangerous items she could have easily put them in his bag and they would have been able to bring it onboard the plane.
With all the ‘increased security’ that’s going on, you would think it’s common sense that they should check both people’s bags. . I was just speechless.
Now, don’t you just feel safe and secure? 