(3 PM – promoted by TheMomCat)
One of my best friends is a commercial pilot for United Airlines and regularly flies 747s from Chicago to Asia and Europe. He lives in Memphis and commutes to Chicago via a connecting flight, usually arriving in Chicago several hours before his scheduled flight. Today he missed his connecting flight from Memphis to Chicago after being detained and groped by the TSA. Of course, he was not able to make his Chicago to London flight and lost his pay.
My friend and client is a no-nonsense guy who doesn’t put up with much. He was politely waiting in line to go through the Memphis checkpoint when he noticed that only one line was available. After hearing customers complaining, he decided to ask a TSA supervisor if another check line could be opened.
After getting a hostile negative response, he decided to drop the matter as he was in a hurry to catch his flight. Since he was going to be piloting a plane in several hours, he was wearing his United Airlines uniform. Since he is a pilot he was not required to stand in line and had been immediately ushered through the normal x-ray checkpoint without problems or alarms going off.
After passing through the checkpoint, he noticed a female TSA employee not going through the checkpoint and made a comment about the person not being checked. That is when the shit hit the fan. She immediately required him to go through a punitive recheck.
He had been told that the TSA didn’t have enough staff to open another line yet about eight TSA people came and interrogated him when the situation heated up. Every thing he had was scrupulously searched and he was patted down. He was moved to an area outside of the view of other passengers.
Then the groping began. After being touched in the genitals the first time, my friend asked the TSA groper if he liked touching my friend’s genitals. After my friend asked the question, the TSA groper told my friend that my friend’s comment was not appropriate, yet proceeded to start the search over and pat his genitals again two or three more times. Apparently my friend’s genitals were touched a total of three or four times, the last two or three with hard upward karate type chops. [Is whacking your balls considered groping; I’m not sure].
The TSA also called the police. My friend was also required to give a policeman a copy of his driver’s license as a further delay and harassment tactic. While all of this was going on, the TSA officials at the checkpoints were paying attention to this incident and not paying much attention to the luggage they were supposed to be checking, making the incident a real security fiasco.
The TSA knew my friend was not flying a plane out of Memphis, so it kept him until his connecting flight nearly left the gate. The TSA let him go before the plane left, but although he ran to the gate, he didn’t catch his flight because it was a long way from the checkpoint. After suffering this degradation, to add insult to injury, he will also lose about $2000 in pay he would have made for the trip. So he had to call in sick, use sick time, and miss work.
We both agree it was probably best that he missed the connecting flight since it was probably best that he did not end up piloting his plane after being confined, humiliated, intimidated, harassed, and degraded. I wouldn’t want my pilot’s mind to be on something other than flying the plane.
This was egregious behavior by the TSA on so many levels. So tonight I assisted him with filing a formal complaint with the TSA. He has given me permission to discuss this matter publicly but I have chosen not to disclose his name at this time.
Apparently there are several other pilots who have pissed off the TSA and have had reprisals by the TSA, some of whom have been grounded and still may not be flying.
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Coming to a airport near you.
I wonder if the pail, the hood, and the electrodes are next.
This is how neo-feudalism looks. And this will spread everywhere. In a few years they will confiscate your money to pad their salaries which will not be very high. My motto is always “stay away from the man” (what we used to call the cops in the old days). That means anyone who has arbitrary power over you.
This arbitrary power will extend to rape and this will create a new industry of people who will get various levels of security clearances (for a fee) to travel freely. The proles will be forced to beg for mercy from the freaks who will man TSA with their cancer inducing machines.
In the meantime I’m sorry for your friend but we don’t live in the U.S.A. anymore it has been taken over by a foreign occupying force. Any other POV is dreaming. Train, bus, and car travel will eventually be monitored as well. Eventually we’ll just have to hike to travel. I hope they won’t have TSA checkpoints on the Appalachian Trail.
I won’t fly unless it is strictly required. The whole atmosphere gives me the creeps.
According to the TSA, 77% of all flights in the United States are of a non-commercial nature. These flights can include business and/or personal flights as well as those for pilot training.
Charter airlines are now advertising that their passengers can fly without the hassles associated with flying commercial.
One may ask which security measures apply to Rush Limbaugh when he decides to fly somewhere in his private jet. In addition to Rush, there is a flight crew and whoever else might be part of his entourage on these flights.
Although this is no doubt a rhetorical question, are the same security measures in place for the 77% of flights that are not commercial? Unless that answer is an unqualified “yes”, the implications are obvious.