Monkeywrenching airport security
Walk into an airport in baggy pants with powdered expolosives in a leg bag which can slowly be dispersed as you walk (perhaps controlled by some sort of string control like POWs scattered excavated soil in "The Great Escape"). After walking around in the lobby it should soon be tracked to the security checkpoints and interfere with any current swab or automated detection methods.
keyser-soze@hushmail.com wrote:
Subject: Monkeywrenching airport security
Walk into an airport in baggy pants with powdered expolosives in a leg bag which can slowly be dispersed as you walk...
Airport chemical "sniffers" apparently look for the signature of nitrogen compounds, not "explosives," per se. I've often wondered how many weekend gardeners have gotten hassled and delayed because of trace amounts of ammonia-based fertilizers on their person and effects. If you plan to fly, be sure to wash your hands thoroughly before heading out for the airport if you have been shoot, gardening or house cleaning. S a n d y
At 10:57 AM 11/17/01 -0800, Sandy Sandfort wrote:
Airport chemical "sniffers" apparently look for the signature of nitrogen compounds, not "explosives," per se. I've often wondered how many weekend gardeners have gotten hassled and delayed because of trace amounts of ammonia-based fertilizers on their person and effects. If you plan to fly, be sure to wash your hands thoroughly before heading out for the airport if you have been shoot, gardening or house cleaning.
I've wondered about that too; airport sniffers must have encountered Miracle Gro and angina nitro during the early days, measuring a false alarm rate. Shooting is scary; you could contaminate your car driving back from the range, then contaminate your travel gear. The explosives expert in one of the older terror trial docs on cryptome says things suggesting that a few washes will remove traces. (And contaminate clothes washed with them.) I once checked out the screen on a sniffer, and they list "nitrates" as a category. I suppose having PETN (another category) detected on your laptop would be harder to explain :-)
On Saturday, November 17, 2001, at 05:41 PM, David Honig wrote:
At 10:57 AM 11/17/01 -0800, Sandy Sandfort wrote:
Airport chemical "sniffers" apparently look for the signature of nitrogen compounds, not "explosives," per se. I've often wondered how many weekend gardeners have gotten hassled and delayed because of trace amounts of ammonia-based fertilizers on their person and effects. If you plan to fly, be sure to wash your hands thoroughly before heading out for the airport if you have been shoot, gardening or house cleaning.
I've wondered about that too; airport sniffers must have encountered Miracle Gro and angina nitro during the early days, measuring a false alarm rate. Shooting is scary; you could contaminate your car driving back from the range, then contaminate your travel gear.
The explosives expert in one of the older terror trial docs on cryptome says things suggesting that a few washes will remove traces. (And contaminate clothes washed with them.)
I once checked out the screen on a sniffer, and they list "nitrates" as a category. I suppose having PETN (another category) detected on your laptop would be harder to explain :-)
I don't see what the big concern is here. Just stand there and say nothing. They're going to go through the bags as they wish anyway. The nitrogen connection has been known for many years, too. I remember hearing that _marzipan_ candy tends to set off the detectors, something to do with the almonds and nitrates and all. Big deal. Just stand there and let them search. Using your range bag for carryone luggage is perfectly legal, providing you haven't left any shells inside, or any bore cleaning brushes which might be used as Assault Brushes. --Tim May "Ben Franklin warned us that those who would trade liberty for a little bit of temporary security deserve neither. This is the path we are now racing down, with American flags fluttering."-- Tim May, on events following 9/11/2001
On Sat, 17 Nov 2001, David Honig wrote:
At 10:57 AM 11/17/01 -0800, Sandy Sandfort wrote:
Airport chemical "sniffers" apparently look for the signature of nitrogen compounds, not "explosives," per se. I've often wondered how many weekend
Unless they look for nitrogen in bulk of the specimen (PGNAA), a very expensive/low-processivity technique unsuitable for mass luggage screening they're limited to stuff stuck to surfaces (lasers, swabbing/ion motility spectrometer) and volatile sniffers (chemical sensors, canines). Many classes of explosives contain no nitrogen, many of those which contain nitrogen and are free of volatile tracers don't emit much volatiles, if properly packaged even very volatile explosives (say, methyl or ethylnitrate) can be sealed (glass bottles). Generally, the maker and the packager, unless they work very cleanly/are suited should not be the courier, nor the outer containers be present in the contaminated area. In short, detection probability is only high for sloppy/dumb people.
gardeners have gotten hassled and delayed because of trace amounts of ammonia-based fertilizers on their person and effects. If you plan to fly,
Salts are different from traces of uncombusted nitrocellulose deposited on any surface of a nearby gun being fired.
be sure to wash your hands thoroughly before heading out for the airport if you have been shoot, gardening or house cleaning.
I've wondered about that too; airport sniffers must have encountered Miracle Gro and angina nitro during the early days, measuring
Nitroglycerin is not volatile, is present in large dilution (~0.1%) in small quanitities (pharma bottle). Ditto nitrate salts in a water solution.
a false alarm rate. Shooting is scary; you could contaminate your car driving back from the range, then contaminate your travel gear.
I think you should be able to get a good positive if you'd fire several rounds of vanilla smokeless with baggage surface being near the muzzle of the gun. Try it sometime, if you're unafraid of winding up in a database. I've found that transporting computer parts (motherboard) in hand luggage can suffice to trigger swabbing (if you're really bored you can discuss detection of Semtex traces with airport security).
The explosives expert in one of the older terror trial docs on cryptome says things suggesting that a few washes will remove traces. (And contaminate clothes washed with them.)
Just use an overall when you're at the range, and wash it separate.
I once checked out the screen on a sniffer, and they list "nitrates" as a category. I suppose having PETN (another category) detected on your laptop would be harder to explain :-)
If you want to fool the security, you should become familiar with the type of detectors used on your luggage. Of course, best solution is using human factors to not have your stuff being screened at all. -- Eugen* Leitl <a href="http://www.lrz.de/~ui22204/">leitl</a> ______________________________________________________________ ICBMTO: N48 04'14.8'' E11 36'41.2'' http://www.lrz.de/~ui22204 57F9CFD3: ED90 0433 EB74 E4A9 537F CFF5 86E7 629B 57F9 CFD3
On Saturday, November 17, 2001, at 05:41 PM, David Honig wrote:
At 10:57 AM 11/17/01 -0800, Sandy Sandfort wrote:
Airport chemical "sniffers" apparently look for the signature of nitrogen compounds, not "explosives," per se. I've often wondered how many weekend gardeners have gotten hassled and delayed because of trace amounts of ammonia-based fertilizers on their person and effects. If you plan to fly, be sure to wash your hands thoroughly before heading out for the airport if you have been shoot, gardening or house cleaning.
I've wondered about that too; airport sniffers must have encountered Miracle Gro and angina nitro during the early days, measuring a false alarm rate. Shooting is scary; you could contaminate your car driving back from the range, then contaminate your travel gear.
I've had a backpack used to transport pistols and ammunition get wiped down at the airport. It can out clean. Doesn't mean anything tho'. -- "Remember, half-measures can be very effective if all you deal with are half-wits."--Chris Klein
At 17:41 -0800 2001/11/17, David Honig wrote:
I've wondered about that too; airport sniffers must have encountered Miracle Gro and angina nitro during the early days, measuring a false alarm rate. Shooting is scary; you could contaminate your car driving back from the range, then contaminate your travel gear.
About a year ago I got on a plane and flew cross country with an empty .22LR case wedged in the cleats of my boots. I discovered it in the hotel while polishing my boots (had a wedding to attend the next morning) and was amused. I guess they'd pick that up now, and I'd spend a few hours in the back with nurse ratchet and a box of rubber gloves. -- J. Eric Townsend -- http://www.spies.com/jet Were you in USASSG/ACSI/MACV in Vietnam, 1967-1970? Drop me a line if so...
participants (7)
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David Honig -
Eugene Leitl -
j eric townsend -
keyser-soze＠hushmail.com -
Petro -
Sandy Sandfort -
Tim May