TSA can't believe MacBook Air is a real laptop, causes owner to miss flight

The TSA has been known to take issue with products designed in Cupertino before, but for one particular traveler, it was Apple's thinnest laptop ever that caused the latest holdup. Upon tossing his ultra-sleek slab of aluminum underneath the scanner, security managed to find enough peculiarities to remove it from the flow, pull it aside and wrangle up the owner for some questions. Apparently, the TSA employee manning the line was flabbergasted by the "lack of a drive" and the complete absence of "ports on the back," and while hordes of co-workers swarmed to investigate, the user's flight took off on schedule. Thankfully, said owner was finally allowed to pass through after some more in-the-know colleagues explained in painfully simple terms what an SSD was, but the poor jet-setter most definitely paid the price for trying to slip some of the latest and greatest under the sharp eyes of the TSA (and cutting it close on time, of course).

[Image courtesy of ABC]

[gobo @ Mar 10th 2008 12:39PM]

Except the Lenovo is big and heavy for a laptop. Ever think that the AIR is meant for a specific audience -- people for whom "thin and simple" is worth top dollar? The MacBook Air isn't a DVD player or a game console, but for traveling salespeople, it's perfect.

[JeffM @ Mar 10th 2008 12:58PM]

3.5 lbs and 10.6" x 8.3" x 1.1" - I'm not sure that exactly big, or heavy.

[ajprice @ Mar 10th 2008 8:16AM]

Was the security a big yellow bald guy eating donuts?

"Ooh, they have the Internet on computers now!"

[Ramel @ Mar 12th 2008 12:46AM]

I hate commenting with just lol but lol.

[KTMJ @ Mar 10th 2008 8:39AM]

This is totally understandable since most TSA agents work the day shift at McDonald's

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z33gpRWWXPA

[Flashpoint @ Mar 10th 2008 8:20AM]

Don't knock TSA too hard. After all, where are all the out of work mortgage brokers suppossed to go?

[pundit @ Mar 10th 2008 8:24AM]

I'm glad we have Transport Canada. They're generally a lot cooler, in my experience. This shows a wonderful combination of the ignorance of these employees (do they not watch TV/read the papers/read an internet news site/live somewhere not under a rock?) and then their incompetence. If he turns it on and it does computer things, shouldn't he be let through? Then of course, we get to the point of maybe a) they didn't recognize the GUI and b) the lack of any error messages meant that it couldn't be a PC. Silly TSA.

[Bob @ Mar 10th 2008 9:00AM]

You also didn't have a terrorist attack that killed 3000+ people in one of your country's major cities. This could be why "Transport Canada" experience is "generally a lot cooler."

[pundit @ Mar 10th 2008 9:07AM]

They still take security very seriously. I had a homemade iPod charger in my bag once. They asked me to show it charging my iPod. I did it, they said cool and sent me along. They tend to be a lot friendlier while doing their job than their counterparts to the south.

I'd also like to bring your attention to Air India Flight 182. It is a disaster that occurred after a plane left Canadian soil, and the result is the largest disaster involving an airplane ever, if you don't include the people who died on the ground in September 11th.

We take our security very seriously. You just don't often hear of being stopped for silly reasons.

[Chebwa @ Mar 10th 2008 9:54AM]

"the lack of any error messages meant that it couldn't be a PC"

Your PC gets a bunch of error messages the moment you turn it on? You must be QUITE tech savvy! Awesome show, great job.

[Gokor @ Mar 11th 2008 3:26PM]

I'm pretty sure Canadian security is a lot less angry and bitter because they don't have to deal with angry douchebags nonstop all day who insist they are better than the person working security, and are willing to always let them know what they think.

Face it, most American business men and women are hurried, ill-tempered jerks who look down on everyone and think they're God's gift to the world. Many who aren't business people in America carry the same mindset, oddly enough.

[tcc3 @ Mar 10th 2008 11:51AM]

Bob thats a tired argument. Our government has gotten a lot of mileage from fearmongering.

A fraction as much competent security is worth more than the abundance of useless security we have now.

[andy @ Mar 10th 2008 1:36PM]

"if you don't inlude all the people that were killed on the ground on 9/11"


How do you count people killed by terrorism if you don't count people killed by terrorism?



Isn't this a bit like saying that Iraq is the safest place on the face of the earth per capita as long as you don't count all of those people killed by bombs?

[pundit @ Mar 10th 2008 2:00PM]

The people on the ground can't be controlled by the TSA. Leaving them out of the picture, however tragic, there were more deaths in the Canadian incident. Not that I'm proud of that. Terrorism is bad. We need effective and efficient security to deal with it.

[Siggy @ Mar 10th 2008 2:15PM]

Yeah, our screeners are a lot more laid back.

Leaving Vancouver International one time, I had to explain to my parents what the screener was doing when he was doing the residue check on my laptop.

The screener overheard me, and joked when the check was done, "Oooh, bad news, it's positive, you're not getting on your flight." I laughed at him and told him, "Yeah right, if it was, those two cops chatting over by the wall would have me on the ground already."

He laughed and handed back my laptop.

[erasure25 @ Mar 15th 2008 3:39PM]

I guess you missed the part where another TSA agent explained to the first about SSDs. I would be careful about attributing ignorance to all of the TSA based on something that 1 person did. Certainly, to assume is to make ... you a very unpopular person in general.

[shanoboy @ Mar 10th 2008 8:25AM]

This sounds like guerilla marketing to me.

"There's no way this is a laptop, no drive, no ports, its so small and sleek...."

"No, it is! It's Apple's new macbook air!"

[Steve @ Mar 10th 2008 9:53AM]

I thought the exact same thing when I read this. Sounds like Apple trying to boost what little interest there is in the Air.

[ET @ Mar 10th 2008 11:09AM]

I agree, what about eeePC? isn't it smaller without a harddrive?

[Zak @ Mar 10th 2008 12:04PM]

Yes, Steve. There's so little interest stores can't keep it in stock, and people like you just cannot stop commenting on it. Clearly there's no interest in it at all. And yes, obviously Apple had something to do with it, since they own the TSA and tell their employees to play dumb. It couldn't possibly be because most TSA employees aren't smart enough to work a toaster, could it?

Lucky for you, common sense doesn't seem to be a requirement for being able to comment on Engadget.

[Will @ Mar 10th 2008 12:35PM]

Zak, I think you missed shanoboy's and Steve's point. If it is indeed guerilla marketing, then the whole event never happened, and it's just a made up story to showcase the Air.

Also, if I were Steve I would've used the word "demand" instead of "interest". There is a lot of interest in the Air, as it was the highlight of the Macworld keynote, and it is a very unique product. However, the demand for the product is surely less than Apple would've hoped. (The price is too high for now)

[ReggieXuk @ Mar 10th 2008 8:26AM]

couldn't he of made them check apple.com real quick?

[nxtiak @ Mar 10th 2008 8:37AM]

Ya, that's all we need, TSA fools browsing the internet and not doing their jobs.......
Wait.... they already don't do their jobs.
K, I guess Internet for them is ok.

[robotrock @ Mar 10th 2008 8:35AM]

when we feel TSA is too lax we complain we aren't safe...when we feel they are too paranoid we complain again...

[Nick @ Mar 10th 2008 8:40AM]

Kudos to Steve Job's PR department for this one. Great idea!

[KPrime @ Mar 10th 2008 1:58PM]

I felt perfectly safe flying before all their crap security measures, and I would still feel just as safe now even if they had not changed their security even slightly.

I have accidentally left my rather large pocket knife in my backpack, and after I took my shoes off, stripped all metal off my body, and was manually scanned because the rivets in my jeans set off the alarm, I grabbed my backpack still with my large knife in it, and walked to my plane. I felt so much safer having gone through all that hassle. :-P

They did an internal test a year or so ago, to see how prepared the TSA was, and they found that they missed 13 out of 15 attempts to smuggle bombs/guns/knifes and other illegal items.
Very Sad!

[brent98 @ Mar 10th 2008 8:38AM]

"If he turns it on and it does computer things, shouldn't he be let through? Then of course, we get to the point of maybe a) they didn't recognize the GUI and b) the lack of any error messages meant that it couldn't be a PC. Silly TSA."

If they turn it on IT MIGHT EXPLODE!!! Or not.

[crimson400 @ Mar 10th 2008 8:46AM]

What a bunch of idiots. What do they do with tablet PCs that come through?

[Barton @ Mar 10th 2008 8:51AM]

"OMG HE SAID TABLET! AS IN DRUG TABLETS! ARREST HIM!"

"uh... it's a tablet PC."

"OMG HE SAID TABLET AGAIN! SHOOT HIM!"

[THJahar @ Mar 10th 2008 8:50AM]

pfft....that's nowt....Try getting a Dell Vostro 1500 through the airport scanner.
They stopped me with mine. The vostro's air ducts look like miniature hand scythes under x-ray, and it took me an age to explain to the guys in security at Manchester Airport UK what an airduct was and why it was needed.

[Marcus Kirsch @ Mar 10th 2008 8:51AM]

yes the AIR is beautiful, but not really light and not really capable, so somewhere weirdly in between.
Get yourself a ASUS EEE PC, its not fancy but just small, mobile and does the basics for a super cheap price, what more do you need (unless you want a media machine and not a wireless machine)

[Ellianth @ Mar 10th 2008 9:10AM]

*slides some money under a table*

The boss said to tell you that you really earned your pay today :).

[technophobe @ Mar 10th 2008 8:51AM]

To be honest anyone who owns a MBA is a pretentious twat, and deserves to to stopped at the airport

[Barton @ Mar 10th 2008 8:53AM]

I see why your username is technophobe.

[technophobe @ Mar 10th 2008 8:58AM]

touché, but the guy clearly didn't have anything important to do otherwise he would have brought a real computer!

[Twitchy @ Mar 10th 2008 9:41AM]

Perhaps his employer bought the MBA for him.

I would have not brought a private Laptop on a business trip - might not be covered by the employers insurance.

[insertAlias @ Mar 10th 2008 9:44AM]

Right, if businessmen aren't rendering 3d images and encoding video on the go they have nothing important to do...

Just because you or I can't imagine paying money for an underspec'd machine, doesn't mean that nobody can. Some people value form or style or weight more than horsepower. And the MBA is perfectly capable of doing all the day-to-day things an average user does. I wouldn't buy it, but I can see why some people would.

[Gian @ Mar 10th 2008 9:58AM]

Woah, woah, woah..."a real computer"? Who's the pretentious twat here?

I'm a professional. I use my laptop for everything I do. I do engineering and testing and programming and give presentations and crunch numbers. To be honest, I almost never use my DVD drive and only use two ports on my laptop on a regular basis: one of the USB ports and the audio out jack. I use a MacBook Pro with a bluetooth mouse. Don't get me wrong. I would never buy a MacBook Air, simply because the extra weight of the MacBook Pro is completely outweighed by the size of the screen. But really, that's it. If a MacBook Air with a 15"+ screen and a bigger hard drive was available at the time I bought the MacBook Pro, I probably would have purchased a MacBook Air.

There's a whole lot of BS out there about what it doesn't have. My previous laptop was a Sony Vaio GRV680. It was one of the early "desktop replacement" laptops. It had everything and enough juice to still be an awesome laptop in 2008. It didn't matter that it had everything. Most of the ports hardly ever got used and all that beef resulted in a meltdown from heat issues. On top of that, it had a sucky OS.

My point: More is not always better, and functionality/practicality is rather individual. We all have different requirements. Computers are like fitted jeans. One size does not fit all. Most people force themselves into something painful because everyone else is doing it.

So, stop being such a twat. :-)

Gian

[Jorge @ Mar 10th 2008 8:54AM]

I think I'm more shocked that someone actually bought the SSD version.

[Gian @ Mar 10th 2008 1:23PM]

I'm with you, buddy. Buying the SSD option is just throwing away money for nothing.

[james @ Mar 11th 2008 1:51AM]

it could be that the traveler bought the ssd mba cause it was the only one in stock. the mba's are selling very well for apple, in some stores they're out of the ones with the traditional hd and have maybe one or 2 with the ssd in stock. they too are hot sellers.

[Julian Bond @ Mar 10th 2008 8:58AM]

The eeePC could be worse. "I refuse to believe that's a fully featured laptop, it looks like a toy."

Of course the explosives in a MacBook Air can't be changed without returning it to an Apple Store, so the TSA should be more than happy to let it on the flight.

[anon @ Mar 10th 2008 9:01AM]

Oh, I feel SO sorry for this guy... What idiot doesn't get to the airport at least 2 hours early because they know it's going to take forever to actually get through security and to your terminal? I don't believe they were looking at the laptop for 2 hours trying to figure out what it was. The guy was late getting to the airport, and wanted to blame someone else instead of saying "damn, I was late and I missed my flight." No, lets blame everyone else but yourself. Why do people have to blame everyone else when they do something wrong? Non story. I got mad at myself for wasting time reading it, and his stupid little "blog post" about it. What a moron...

[pundit @ Mar 10th 2008 9:10AM]

Yet you replied anyway.

I'm sure the guy enjoyed the wait until his new flight while sipping free drinks in the executive lounge. (He bought a $3000 computer, so I'm sure he was flying business and/or is a frequent flier.) As an added bonus, he doesn't need to worry about his 4 hour battery life, 'cause the lounge and airplane likely have a power port.

[whowhatme @ Mar 10th 2008 12:00PM]

not necessarily. i've gone without food so i can afford apple computers :(

[craig @ Mar 10th 2008 12:24PM]

Finally, someone who got the real story!

No way such a minor incident would have made him miss his flight. If it occurred at all, he missed his flight because he was late.

I find it hard to believe that any of this story is true. The MBA is not significantly different than any other computer from TSA's perspective.

Apple people sure do have to struggle for their superiority.

[Ellianth @ Mar 10th 2008 9:08AM]

Why not just turn the laptop on?

[Luke D @ Mar 10th 2008 9:44AM]

Because if it was a bomb that's the last thing the staff there would want...

[Ellianth @ Mar 10th 2008 9:49AM]

True but if the guy had a bomb and he was about to go away for life, and he was prepared to kill himself, he'd have set the bomb off the moment they discovered it was a bomb.

[Flashpoint @ Mar 10th 2008 10:18AM]

Considering all the laptop batteries that have gone nuclear recently, I can't blame the TSA for being worried about batteries containing explosives. The Federal government needs to xray computer parts for just this reason. A C4 package shaped into a battery would take down a jumbo jet.