The policy began as a direct response to the Richard Reid shoe bombing attempt in December 2001 [1]. This was as America was still reeling from 9/11, and full body scanners weren't standard at airports yet. Now they are, and they've improved explosive detectors too [2].
It indeed seems like it was always something of an overreaction, but an understandable one that's now fully overlapped by superior modern scanning.
Every time an article about airport security is posted the comments are the same.
To prove that I'm sane and my memory has not been corrupted by time or cosmic rays I google "airline hijackings by year", I look at the graphs in google images, and I briefly wonder what happened in early 1970s and 2000s before remembering what happened in early 1970s and 2000s.
Then I murmur "that's some fantastically effective theater".
can you find any stats on yearly hijackings that are limited to only flights where hijackers made it through american security, though? all I can find are global aggregate stats and its a bit unfair to credit TSA with preventing the hijacking of a flight from Heathrow to Dubai
Most TSA, FAA, and airline operator policies and procedures are harmonized with ICAO and IATA policies and procedures. Of course, there are regional variations and differences between international and domestic flights within those regions, but for the most part things are consistent among all of the members of both signatories of Convention on International Civil Aviation (ICAO members) and IATA members.
The whole shoe thing was proposed someone who wasn't the US (I think the UK, but my memory is fuzzy-- damn cosmic rays), submitted to ICAO, voted on, and enacted by the US as a signatory.
Why not? Comment thread is about TSA. Article is about TSA. The policy is a TSA policy. Why expand the discussion to include things no one else is talking about, and why do it surreptitiously?
It indeed seems like it was always something of an overreaction, but an understandable one that's now fully overlapped by superior modern scanning.
1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Airlines_Flight_63_(2...
2. https://www.dhs.gov/science-and-technology/news/2022/10/06/f...
Edit: whoa, groupthink.