Saturday, August 12, 2006

Hand baggage

That'll please the operators of airport duty-free shops, won't it? The list of permitted items doesn't allow cameras, DVDs, MP3 players, stuffed camels or even paperback books. Presumably there's suddenly a fear of cabin crew being overpowered and bored to death with readings from 'the first thousand-page volume of a new trilogy from a major new talent...'

At least it's only flights to and from the UK and US that appear to be affected. Villains are apparently not tempted by the dubious delights of - to cite a couple of random examples - Prague to Frankfurt or Doha to Manila.

Look on the bright side, though. The mobile-phone addicts (and indeed the mobile phone-addicts) who are so desperate to contact their loved-ones the moment the wheels touch the runway will now have to wait until baggage reclaim. And with a total dearth of bags to collect from the overhead bins, no-one will find it necessary to spring up from their seats before the aircraft has come to a complete stop. I assume we'll all get additional baggage allowance to compensate for the six kilos of hand baggage now consigned to the hold.

With no liquids permitted on board, this will prevent passengers from spraying pungent odours all over themselves and through the rest of the cabin. I wonder if perfumes will be permitted in on-board duty-free? Surely not, especially if there's a transit stop. "I'm sorry madam. That half-gallon of Chanel No.5 that you bought en route from Dubai to Frankfurt is confiscated before you board the Frankfurt to Washington flight."

Perhaps, if we are serious about in-flight security, all passengers should strip to their birthday suits and fly in airline-issue disposable paper gowns akin to those issued to hospital patients. All clothing and other effects could then go securely into the hold so that they can be thrown, dropped, lost and occasionally stolen. Imagine the horror of arriving in Reykjavik for a high-level meeting only to discover that your Armani suit and Gucci shoes will shortly be arriving in Melbourne.

Facetiousness aside, full marks to the security services for uncovering the alleged plot and apprehending the alleged villains. Let us all hope they've got the lot, and normality can soon be restored.

5 comments:

halfmanhalfbeer said...

GG; I love the idea of the special suits, classic! You never know though, it might come to this the way this madness is going.

HMHB

Taunted said...

It's all a conspiracy theory!!

Take a look at my thoughts on my blog....

Taunted said...

"Perhaps, if we are serious about in-flight security, all passengers should strip to their birthday suits and fly in airline-issue disposable paper gowns akin to those issued to hospital patients."

And I've got the pic!!

Grumpy Goat said...

With reference to Taunted's previous post... :-0

Keef said...

I assume we'll all get additional baggage allowance to compensate for the six kilos of hand baggage now consigned to the hold.
Well me old Goat, I hope so. But we got stuffed leaving Valencia: everything had to go in the hold and we had to pay for four kilos excess. Utterly ridiculous - it was going on the plane anyway, but they forced us to pay for the privilege of having laptop and assorted cameras deep-frozen and played football with. Barftuds.

 

The opinions expressed in this weblog are the works of the Grumpy Goat, and are not necessarily the opinions shared by any person or organisation who may be referenced. Come to that, the opinions may not even be those of the Grumpy Goat, who could just be playing Devil's Advocate. Some posts may be of parody or satyrical [sic] nature. Nothing herein should be taken too seriously. The Grumpy Goat would prefer that offensive language or opinions not be posted in the comments. Offensive comments may be subject to deletion at the Grumpy Goat's sole discretion. The Grumpy Goat is not responsible for the content of other blogs or websites that are linked from this weblog. No goats were harmed in the making of this blog. Any resemblance to individuals or organisations mentioned herein and those that actually exist may or may not be intentional. May contain nuts.