How often do knives get through the TSA?

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Yo Mama said:
My buddy on a regular commercial flight yesterday with just a carry on, he gets home and out of his backpack he pulls out a Leatherman sidekick, made it all the way through security and on to the plane. He did not know it was there the whole time, when he saw it he couldn't believe it.

How often do you think this happens? Does not make me feel very good about taking a flight.
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You're worried about a leatherman on a commercial flight? Seriously? Before 911, nobody gave knives, shoes or underwear a second thought before getting on an airplane. It's high time we went back there again if you ask me.
 
I was traveling armed on my credentials and got pulled by TSA for explosives residue on my hiking pack. (We had hiked in an area of the Smoky Mountains with saltpeter and other ingredients used for powder during the Civil War.) I let them do their search and investigation and when they were done I showed my creds.

They asked why I hadn't shown them earlier and I said because they had a job to do and I didn't want any special consideration. What if someone had slipped something into my pack unbeknownst to me?

It's a tough job and I don't envy them.
 
Boattale said:
You're worried about a leatherman on a commercial flight? Seriously? Before 911, nobody gave knives, shoes or underwear a second thought before getting on an airplane. It's high time we went back there again if you ask me.
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Keeping this non political, no I don't want someone on the plane with a knife. Totally a different time now.
 
Not TSA but my Swisstool made a Melbourne-Sidney roundtrip in my backpack once. It looks just like a bar on the x- ray.
 
I would pack as if there was a zero chance of your knife getting through security, with your carry on luggage, because odds are that's what will happen.

Checked bags are about risk management, where you try to make sure that anything in those bags isn't something you can't replace or would be too much of a pain to replace. My last flight I had an Artisan Cutlery folder and small fixed blade in my luggage, both easily replaceable and inexpensive knives that I wouldn't cry over getting pilfered. I was flying somewhere, where I'd be spending time at a couple of ranches, so there was zero chance of me heading there without at least one knife. Some airports are a lot worse than others, but fortunately not my local ones. The ones with a bad reputation are the ones I'd fly to with knives in my checked bags and then mail them home, so the staff didn't get their paws on them.
 
The TSA was all set to allow small knives again but the flight attendants and their unions lobbied against it. One of the many reasons flying sucks now.
 
The good old days.... pre 9/11. I boarded a commercial flight from Cancun to Newark carrying a leather rifle scabbard I had bought, stuffed with trinkets and a few souvenir knives.
Flight attendant walking by asked me if there was a rife inside I said no and she just kept going.
 
A lot. A lot of people get caught with them, but so many people go through that even a relatively small percentage of people getting away is an objectively large number. Plus TSA has been shown in penetration testing to miss a substantial percentage of dangerous items.

That being said, I can tell you personally that the answer for me is that if I forgot about a knife in a carry-on bag, I'd get away with it, but I'd totally get arrested and disappeared forever in a CIA black detention site if I deliberately tried to bring a knife in a carry-on.
 
In the year 9/11 I adapted a large diameter mechanical pencil to hold and deploy a length of sharpened piano wire. Seems to work pretty well and Lookes normal in my shirt pocket.

We took a trip and I wanted to try it out with the TSA but wanted to avoid the embarrassment of being arrested in front of my family. So, I disassembled it and put it into my camera bag as two pieces dropped in a side pocket together. Didn't arouse any suspicion or set off any alarms.
 
I was looking for a used multi tool on e-Bay. I think a lot of them offered there have been confiscated by TSA and auctioned off.
 
Bob Denman said:
I travel by RV...
I have no interest in how the TSA does their job...
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Wait until they start inspecting vehicles on federal highways.
www.forbes.com

The TSA Is Coming To A Highway Near You

The very thought of federal employees with zero law enforcement training roaming across our nation’s transportation infrastructure with the hope of randomly thwarting a domestic terrorist attack makes about as much sense as EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson’s Environmental Justice tour.
www.forbes.com www.forbes.com
 
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I think we've run our course here...let's get back to knives and leave the administration of government, (hopefully), to those who know what they are doing.
 
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