Have you ever run away? Further than this boy??

[irish]

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-manchester-18979032

I'd say there are a few people who have serious questions to answer today!!! Can't believe no head count was done on the plane...

[Deleted]

wow. If that were my kid I would have been furious with airport security!

[crimsonandclover]

No joke.

I can totally see how it could happen, though. Once when I was flying from Berlin to Stuttgart and back, it would have been possible for me to get my ticket, hand it to someone else, and then they could have flown for me - terrorist or no. My ID was never checked. After the trip, I wrote to the airports to complain about it. They wrote back saying it was the responsibility of the airline. I wrote to the airline, and they wrote back saying it was the responsibility of the airport. I forwarded those mails to the other party saying they had better get it figured out before there was a serious breach in security. Ridiculous. Although I have to say, even in that situation I did have to show my ticket, just no confirming ID that it was, in fact, MY ticket.

[allibally]

Crimson. Do you mean you didn't show ID right before security? Or when you boarded the plane?

[clogged]

I think this was a total freak thing. He happened to catch every single person in an entire chain not doing their jobs properly at that moment.

The question is, why the hell does he get all the slack people and I always get all the up tight anal retentive people?!?! so not fair!!!

[crimsonandclover]

Jul 26, 2012 9:42:48 GMT -5 allibally said:

Crimson. Do you mean you didn't show ID right before security? Or when you boarded the plane?

I mean I went to the counter, showed my passport to get my ticket, and that was it. I wasn't asked for it (my ID) before I went through security, and I wasn't asked for it at the gate. So I could have gotten my ticket, given it to someone else (for argument's sake let's say a terrorist on the no-fly list), and they could have gotten on the plane, no questions asked. I even had my passport out and ready to show and they told me I didn't need it.

Again, it isn't identical to the boy's situation because he didn't even have a ticket, and in my situation I did need to show my ticket on boarding, but no ID, so it could have been anyone getting on that plane with my ticket. I could have also just hung out around the counters, swiped someone else's ticket while they weren't paying attention, and gotten on the plane.

[travelingturtle]

I've had so many instances where I was never asked for an ID because the next person in the process was the one who was going to check it. Usually it's for domestic flights instead of international ones.

In my former life as a travel agent, I've seen crazy things with unaccompanied minors (which I know is not what this situation was, but just to say that even when hiring a person to watch a kid airlines can't be counted on).

[crimsonandclover]

Jul 26, 2012 10:28:13 GMT -5 travelingturtle said:

I've had so many instances where I was never asked for an ID because the next person in the process was the one who was going to check it. Usually it's for domestic flights instead of international ones.

Once when flying internationally with Delta, my ID wasn't checked before boarding, either. I didn't think that was as big of a deal as what I described above with the domestic flight because in order to get into the gate area I had to go through the border control, where my passport was checked, but they aren't responsible for checking your ticket. So again, I could have given my ticket to someone else (although in this case it couldn't have been anyone wanted for a crime or they would have been caught at the border control station, at least theoretically), and they could have boarded instead of me. I complained to Delta and they took full responsibility, apologizing and saying that IDs should always be checked upon boarding.

[allibally]

I've never had my ID checked right before boarding when they are scanning your tickets. Are they suppose to?

I can only think of one instance and that was flying international just after the underwear bomber dude Christmas 2009. I had to go through double security at the gate we all had to be hand searched and carry on double checked and ID check.

[bjelle00]

Jul 26, 2012 8:35:42 GMT -5 crimsonandclover said:

No joke.

I can totally see how it could happen, though. Once when I was flying from Berlin to Stuttgart and back, it would have been possible for me to get my ticket, hand it to someone else, and then they could have flown for me - terrorist or no. My ID was never checked. After the trip, I wrote to the airports to complain about it. They wrote back saying it was the responsibility of the airline. I wrote to the airline, and they wrote back saying it was the responsibility of the airport. I forwarded those mails to the other party saying they had better get it figured out before there was a serious breach in security. Ridiculous. Although I have to say, even in that situation I did have to show my ticket, just no confirming ID that it was, in fact, MY ticket.

I saw this article and had to laugh. I wonder what the kid thought of his "trip".

We just got back from a trip to Switzerland. We flew from Bergen to Copenhagen to Geneva. Our passports/ID were NEVER checked. As in, we checked in online, checked our baggage through the self-baggage check, went through security and boarded two different planes without ever showing our IDs.

[clickerish]

I can TOTALLY see this happening after my last flights. Nobody checked my ID ever. Most of the time they didn't check my ticket upon boarding either.

The flight from Zurich to Lisbon, the flight attendant (easyjet) got really angry because the gate let a passenger on who had a piece of paper that wasn't a ticket. He actually had a ticket for another day, which he eventually found, but still. Had the flight attendant not checked onboard, we would have flown off with an extra person who technically did not have a ticket. She got pretty brutal with people who had children and so forth, and some people complained...apparently she had good reason!