Sir, - The level of security for flyers nowadays verges on the farcical. A few, but certainly not all people are asked whether or not they have any battery operated goods in their cases at check-in. Of course they have everybody has electric shavers, calculators, cameras, bedside radio/alarm clocks, etc. But is anybody going to admit it and have to completely unpack their case in the departure lounge? Certainly not.
Next we go to the special security gates, which are so sensitive that I had to take the belt off my trousers and my wife was frisked because a small strip of headache pills had set it off, while reporters regularly walk through with dummy bombs. Finally on the plane, we are told that people are being allowed on with CD players, portable phones and laptop computers - all of which are capable of interfering with the plane's computer controls, the announcement says. To reassure the more nervous passengers, the stewardess then politely asks all the owners of this equipment not to use it because, I assume, a lot of nice people would be seriously inconvenienced by the plane plummeting into the ground.
Can all the other 200 passengers be trusted not to turn their equipment on after a few drinks to see what happens, I always ask myself. Do they not also know that such equipment can easily be turned on from the ground, if someone wanted to be naughty? If they still also allow diplomatic bags on unsearched, I think we should be grateful that there are not more Lockerbies or planes diving into mountains.
Perhaps even more absurd, if that were possible, is the fact there are a few loonies around who think that a fear of flying is irrational. Yea, verily, the inmates are running the asylum. - Yours, etc.,
Tinahely, Co Wicklow.