Two problems. One solution.

The western world has been dumping on Somalia for years - their fisherman and locals have taken to hitting the seas hijacking ships to try and make ends meet.

I'd like to see a charity formed to provide these bandits with better boats and supplies, allowing them to travel to asia and start hijacking and perhaps even sinking a few Japanese ships.

It wouldn't even take an exorbitant amount of money to keep going once the whole thing was rolled into a new reality TV show to replace the current Whale Wars. Not to mention the ransom they could collect from the Japanese.

Southpark has a enlightening analysis of the situation.

That might work as well as my proposed solution to prevent aircraft hijackings. My solution also has the advantage of saving millions (billions?) of dollars in airport operating expenses.

Instead of all the elaborate security precautions to make sure that nobody gets on board the aircraft with deadly weapons (like knitting needles and crochet hooks) they should just arm every passenger as he boards the plane. No, not with any weapon that could pierce the skin of the plane, but with a compressed air pistol loaded with a single anesthetic dart. The dosage of the dart would be calibrated so that one or two hits would cause drowsiness and disorientation; three or five hits would cause unconsciousness, and six or more would be quickly fatal.

It would take a bold hijacker indeed to stand up in front of 250 armed passengers and suggest a change in destination or purpose of the airplane.

But, despite the brilliance of my plan, nobody listens to me so we still have to deal with the TSA and surrender our bottles of shampoo and soda pop. I tell you, I just don't know what's wrong with the world today.

tanstaafl.

"Chicken and cow?"

I've already expressed in other threads how I feel about South Park. But I'll do it again. It's just about the best animated show on TV today and generally one of the best 30 minute format shows period. Plainly more consistently funny than anything else I can remember.

No one will ever hijack a plane again anyway. On September 10, 2001, everyone assumed that if a plane was hijacked, its passengers were kidnap victims who were likely to be returned.

That assumption has been completely thrown out of the window. Now the assumption is that everyone on the plane is going to die, and there should be enough numbers for there to be enough people able to overcome their fear and overwhelm the hijackers. Assuming that the stories are true, this is exactly what happened on United 93, and I'm sure any potential hijackers are well aware of this. There is no longer any possibility for a successful hijacking without the first step being the disabling of all the passengers.

Apparently not everyone got the memo.

Peter

7 notable hijackings have occurred after 9/11.

I'll give this to Bitt: no hijacking of an aircraft with predominantly Americans on board is going to follow the old script. Given how much I fly, I've long since steeled myself to the knowledge that, given a hijacking, I'll already be dead so I'll have nothing to lose.

That was true for 5 years. I don't believe that hijacking in US airspace, with predominantly or all americans on board, would go any differently (from a passenger standpoint) than any of the hijackings in Tom's list, given the same or similar circumstances.

It's not likely that another scenario similar to that of Sep 11 2001 would play out again the same way however, so I do agree in that respect. The hijackings since then have been much more traditional and that's likely why they didn't elicit the response from passengers that some people like to believe would result in "any" hijacking situation.

Besides, this doesn't have much to do with the hijackings off the coast of Somalia. Most of the "pirates" are the actual victims in that case and they certainly don't want to kill or harm the crew of the ships they're taking.

Hm, you'd think that as easy as that research was, I'd have done some. Oh well.

Even prior to 9/11, not many planes were hijacked in the US anyhow. The only notable one on that list in the 90s was a FedEX plane. 9/11 changed peoples perceptions due to the terrible events that followed the hijackings, but even then the idea of using a commercial plane as a weapon wasn't new. It seems Air France Flight 8969 in 1994 was the first attempt, though it failed.

No, but it certainly wasn't in popular consciousness.

I really don't understand how they are not classed as a vigilante terrorist group. That programs does nothing but highlight what a total bunch of idiots those people are. If I were to back an anti whaling campaign it certainly wouldn't be them.

They are their own worst enemy, and imagine making a program that is broadcast around the world to highlight your total lack in ability to prevent whaling. The Japanese fleet must piss their pants when they watch it back.

I'm not clued up enough on whaling to figure out which side is right, and would class the over killing of whales in the same class of concern I have for lots of other ocean species. The only thing I know is that no matter what they do on Sea Shepherd all they will do is make it worse. I say next time their ship is sailing anywhere near Somalia those pirates should hijack and take over the operation, at least you'd have someone in charge who had half an idea of what they were doing.

Cheers

Cris.

Ummm... Tom Clancy might disagree with you. See his book "Executive Orders", published in 1996.

tanstaafl.