[subego]

I figure this is a place where one can admit (at least by poll) they do without any fear of accidental confusion they actually intend to do so.

[ebuddy]

What the?!? I wouldn't answer either way. For example, let's say I admit that I do not have the skill to take out an airliner and then one wants to get all up in my face.

[subego]

Who is "one" in this scenario?

And why would they get up in your face for either answer?

[subego]

NERD POLICE!

Show us your license and soldering iron.

[subego]

Are y'all seriously this afraid of the man?

[The Final Dakar]

I'm curious what inspired this poll.

[subego]

OP will deliver, but I would prefer to wait for some answers first lest I soil the sample.

[subego]

There may be a TWiT angle...

[The Final Dakar]

Fine. Only on XBOX.

[subego]

My answer is "yes", BTW.

[subego]

Originally Posted by The Final Dakar 

Fine. Only on XBOX.

I have a general idea of what most of the regulars would answer, but I admit I wasn't sure with you.

[subego]

Do you consider yourself to be a "hands on/get em' dirty" type?

[The Final Dakar]

I'm this close to leaving the thread, so as not to dirty it with input from anyone who isn't named subego

[Uncle Skeleton]

I am able to take an airliner out to dinner, but not to take one out of a movie, like an "out-take." What should I put in the poll?

[subego]

"Unique Snowflake".

[mattyb]

I can stop one being made, does that count?

[BLAZE_MkIV]

Being able to take out an airliner is one thing. Getting close enough to do it is another. Is it a particular airliner or any airliner? Is it just the plane or do you want the passengers too?

[subego]

With people.

You get close by buying a ticket.

If you don't feel suicidal, you can get a pawn to carry your payload, but they have to be able to get past security the same way you would if you were doing it personally.

[andi*pandi]

Do you need technical skill? If it's just sitting around, I suppose anyone could open the hood and pull out random wires, take a sledgehammer to the control panel, etc.

The skill is getting access, disabling it, and getting home again, without being caught.

edit: oh, so you mean take DOWN, not just take out... midflight, with people on board.

Get 20 suicidal friends. Each of you fill your 3oz shampoo bottles with something flammable...

[subego]

I'm talking where all the King's men aren't putting it back together "take out", while full of people.

Getting home is optional, but not getting caught isn't.

[The Final Dakar]

I feel like we're heading for a TSA discussion.

[subego]

Dammit! I said wait!

[BLAZE_MkIV]

Hit it when it's taking off, most airports don't have enough setback at the end of the runway so they're still fairly close to the ground. There are quite a few ways to release all the energy stored in a running jet engine.

Or get a job at airbus and shave a few decimals off the tolerances for a hinge. Bonus: the bonus for saving a few $$$.

[The Final Dakar]

You didn't say 'don't speculate.'

[subego]

Originally Posted by The Final Dakar 

You didn't say 'don't speculate.'

I was hoping you would answer the "hands dirty" question before you went stampeding for the cl... speculation.

[subego]

Originally Posted by BLAZE_MkIV 

Hit it when it's taking off, most airports don't have enough setback at the end of the runway so they're still fairly close to the ground. There are quite a few ways to release all the energy stored in a running jet engine.

Or get a job at airbus and shave a few decimals off the tolerances for a hinge. Bonus: the bonus for saving a few $$$.

I think topic drift towards "how-to" is best avoided.

[The Final Dakar]

Originally Posted by subego 

I was hoping you would answer the "hands dirty" question before you went stampeding for the cl... speculation.

Originally Posted by subego 

Do you consider yourself to be a "hands on/get em' dirty" type?

The answer is no.

[subego]

I guess ebuddy was right. I now have an uncontrollable desire to get up in your face.

[The Final Dakar]

???

[subego]

Never mind. It was just gas.

[BLAZE_MkIV]

Originally Posted by subego 

I think topic drift towards "how-to" is best avoided.

We'll I can come up with several ways off the top of my head, none of them require any technical skill whatsoever. So everyone should be answering yes.

[The Final Dakar]

This thread's pay-off better be good considering the suspense element now being built-in.

[andi*pandi]

Punchline: Subego works for homeland security. Expect knocks on all our doors.

[subego]

Originally Posted by The Final Dakar 

This thread's pay-off better be good considering the suspense element now being built-in.

Don't try and deflect from ruining the surprise.

[Snow-i]

There was one in the bar I was at a few weeks ago. Nasty fella.

[ebuddy]

Originally Posted by subego 

Who is "one" in this scenario?

The airliner, man.

And why would they get up in your face for either answer?

They'd know I was vulnerable and they're waiting to get all up in my face. I'm not havin' it. Nope, won't answer.

[Waragainstsleep]

Destroying stuff is easy. Aircraft are fragile.

[subego]

The basic thesis I was testing here was, with a sample of people skewed towards being interested in technology (like you'd find on a Mac help forum), how many people are clued-in to how simple something like this would be (assuming you were determined).

From there, considering the ease, what exactly could the TSA do to stop something like this? The answer as far as I can see is not a damn thing.

Aren't there genuinely useful things the TSA could be doing?

[Waragainstsleep]

Thats the thing about terrorists and planes, if your goal is to just bring them down at random to create panic, its really not that difficult. At certain airports you could probably do it with a well thrown rock, you could certainly do it with a well-thrown grenade or a cheap & nasty rocket locket launcher. The logical conclusion is that either terrorists are very stupid/incompetent, or they simply don't want to bring down planes like that.

Of course the government position is that they want to hijack them and use them as missiles, but a policy of not surrendering to hijackers and shooting down planes when hijackers reveal themselves should be more effective than any number of strip searches.

[Uncle Skeleton]

Originally Posted by Waragainstsleep 

a policy of not surrendering to hijackers and shooting down planes when hijackers reveal themselves

I don't care how easy it is to bring down a plane, it's still going to be a lot easier to simply let the air force do it for you

[subego]

Out of curiosity, when was the last time a plane was successfully hijacked?

And, if it has been awhile as I believe it to be the case, is this because of the due diligence of the TSA, or because if you try, everybody on the plane knows F-16s are being scrambled, so you better take care of it yourself unless you want to become Sidewinder bait?

[Uncle Skeleton]

Terrorism is like kicking a hornets nest, you do it for the reaction. While the hornets are still terrorized from the last kick, there's not much to be gained by kicking it again until they settle down and start ignoring you again.

[el chupacabra]

If by "a well thrown rock" you mean throwing a rock into an engine of plane in this situation;



then I don't think it would do much to knock it out of the sky... It is already in the process of gliding down, empty on fuel. It would take someone with the skill and coordination of a football player; and even then you're not guaranteed you could get a rock in a 100mph object. But you'd be guaranteed to be arrested.

Planes can fly with one engine and can glide/land with no engines. Simply taking out the engines and blowing holes in random places won't do the trick.

I can't think of a way to get into the cockpit without someone stopping me.
I don't have the skill to hack the navigation systems, or build a bomb, and I don't know anyone who does.
I don't want to kill myself so I would need a remote detonator which I have no skill for.
TSA may suck but I cant think of a way I could guarantee getting a bomb past them and don't think it's worth the gamble. So I don't have the skill to take out a plane.

If someone did put the time into acquiring such skills they would probably have a good job, a good life; in which case they wouldn't want to waste time taking out planes. This is where profiling comes in.

You must understand without profiling, such security falls flat on its face. The left calls profiling racist, unfair and demands that if 1 person get screened then everybody get unnecessary screening. It must be politically correct and fair. The importance of that trumps all else. They fail to realize even to the person who's selected every time, the process would be faster for them since the line would move faster.

The true purpose of TSA accomplishes 2 things. One is false sense of security. But Most important it puts you in a subordinate position to government as a reminder of who's dominant, who's in control, no matter how senseless the action is; it gets you used to waiting in lines. It should be noted that the only people who can rise up, fight the government, to create change are wealthy organizations, or wealthy people. Government has a solution to this though. Organizations don't fly; but wealthy people who work for them do. And guess who gets to cut the TSA lines? You guessed it. First class passengers and high mileage/credit card club members of the airline. Interesting union between non biased government and corporation.

Currently you can pay off this mafia and acquire a 'global entry' pass which allows you run passed passport control and customs completely unchecked. Soon this program will transcend to TSA allowing certain people to bypass security. I know this because a couple days ago when I got up to TSA I asked, " What do I have to do to unfairly cut in front of everyone else, is there someone I have to pay off? " And TSA answered very professionally how I could do this in the future... since I don't have airline club cards. It probably wont speed up your line though since it comes with cutting; I've notice the lines take 20 min longer now since they're constantly cutting.

The true security comes from the background checks, and profiling, assuming the person doing them isn't being lazy that day. You and most the people in the world have a data profile with the government. Other offices of DHS have partial access to these and can use this in conjunction with racial, religious, accent, affiliation, dress, tattoos, nationality, number of friends, number of kids, family, age, to profile people before they get on the plane or connect. The 911 terrorists could have been profiled by the fact they were illegal, known terrorist affiliation, muslim, armed to the teeth with cans of tear gas knives etc..

Profiling... not TSA's politically correct line of fairness that allows Gold card members to cut, is how the government catches most its airport criminals, they just don't advertise it. I see arrests by police or Border Protection all the time on international flights. You'll see police or agents standing by the gate or boarding the plane. When they find their targets they don't cuff, they just ask them to come with them to a back room.

[The Final Dakar]

Hijackings are pretty rare by their nature. How many have even happened in the past 30 years?

[mattyb]

Originally Posted by el chupacabra 

If by "a well thrown rock" you mean throwing a rock into an engine of plane in this situation;

Gas turbines go through pretty strenuous tests before being certified to power an aircraft. One of these is the bird strike. While a rock would seriously fcuk up the engine, it wouldn't destroy the aircraft.

[subego]

I'm with Eddie Izzard in that "bird strike" is really more like "engine suck".

[BLAZE_MkIV]

Drychem from a fire extinguisher > rock. Also you attack it on takeoff not approach. Takeoff is easier for the pilot but there are few to no recovery options and most commercial pilots these days aren't test pilot caliber.

[subego]

Dude...

People really frown on this sort of discussion.

[The Final Dakar]

Bottom line is your sample size sucked.

[subego]

I'd say it's pretty consistent with what I was expecting.

People who are handy feel like they could pull it off.