TSA can order immediate revocation of a pilot license

[narcimund 0]

Hey, jump pilots! Got any personal enemies in the Federal Gov? Have a neighbor who works at the TSA who doesn't like how often you mow your lawn? Ever said no to a federal employee who made a pass at you? Ever sent an email bitching about the loss of civil rights?

You can now lose your pilot's license on the order of the TSA if they determine you're a threat to security. What makes it ridiculous is there is absolutely no definition of "threat". If they say so, that's the end of the story. It could be enough if you're registered to the other major party (not to mention the minor ones which are actually more likely to get you in trouble!)

Hell, if you tried to bring your rig on board a commercial flight and got harassed by an overeager TSA screener, you can now lose your license and there's no meaningful appeal.

I might even lose my pilot's license just for saying on this forum that it's an unreasonable rule. Wouldn't that be ironic?

AOPA report

First Class Citizen Twice Over

[Lizard 0]

Some insight on these idiots. I'm a mechanic for an airline, and came up the jetway one morning from an aircraft. These idiots see me come into the terminal and when I went to go back down to the aircraft, they wanted to "wand" me. Hell I had a gerber tool, steel toe shoes, screwdriver and not to mention I had access to the aircraft before I came into the terminal. I had to get our operations guy to tell them I could go back to the aircraft. Sorry to bitch, but I have to deal with these assholes everyday and when it comes to these people common sense does not exsist. So if this is true, some idiot that has no insight at all to the transportation buisness can get your license revoked.

[PhreeZone 20]

What we need to do is figure out how the hell to get the TSA disolved...

Ohhh... I got it, next election someone needs to run on that platform!

Yesterday is history
And tomorrow is a mystery

Parachutemanuals.com

[BadDog 0]

Well, I certainly feel safer. We all know that no self respecting terrorist would dare to fly a plane without a valid pilot's certificate! But what about all those drug stores selling weapons of mass destruction (fingernail clippers, safety razors, etc)? We gotta shut 'em down now before someone gets hurt. I'm gonna prepay my taxes so Bush can afford to go after these bad guys and take their papers NOW. That'll stop 'em for sure.

(There go my certificates.)

[BadDog 0]

Not that it makes much difference, but technically the TSA determines if someone poses a threat and the FAA decides whether to yank the certificate according to the AOPA summary of the rules.

[Lizard 0]

Thats exactly what I'm talking about. Things like taking fingernail clippers from a pilot. Never mind the crash ax in the cockpit. Common sense is gone. One pilot told me that a TSA agent was searching his flight bag and asked him to turn his headset on for him.

[Jessica 0]

Update (sorry for formatting):

PILOTS QUESTION NEW RULES THAT LET FAA REVOKE CERTIFICATES
By BRYON OKADA
c.2002 Fort Worth Star-Telegram
New rules issued by the Transportation Security Administration that can ban pilots, mechanics and dispatchers from working are drawing the ire of aviation-industry experts and pilot groups.
In the name of combating terrorism, the rules allow the Federal Aviation Administration to revoke, suspend or refuse the airman certificate of anyone the TSA deems a threat to national security. The certificate is required for pilots, mechanics and dispatchers.
The rules were posted Friday without warning on the Federal Register, and they took effect immediately, without the typical industry feedback. Pilot groups say the rules are so vague that there is no way of knowing what criteria will be used or whether someone who is banned can appeal.
“It raises a series of questions, and you can't find the answers in the language of the rule,” said Gregg Overman, a spokesman for the Allied Pilots Association, the union for American Airlines pilots. “We have some work to do here.”
On Monday, TSA officials in Washington, D.C., referred questions to regional public-affairs offices. Phone calls to the regional office that oversees Dallas/Fort Worth Airport were not returned.
Industry experts also say the TSA is widening the use of national-security concerns to circumvent public access to information and to deny jobs to some people.
“It's called fascism,” said Mike Boyd, an industry consultant in Colorado who is one of the TSA's harshest critics. “It's the most egregious thing so far. This is an unaccountable agency with no oversight, and they hide everything behind national security.
“It could develop into a gestapo. All they have to do is say, ‘You're a threat.' They don't have to prove it, because they give you no due process.”
Boyd said other examples of the trend toward secrecy include the TSA's refusal to make public a final report on a security breach Jan. 9 at D/FW Airport and its squelching of whistle-blowers.
Officials with the Allied Pilots Association plan to contact the TSA to get a detailed explanation of the rules, Overman said. They will also submit comments to the Department of Transportation and the FAA.
The Coalition of Airline Pilots Associations, an umbrella group of several major pilot unions, is considering filing an appeal with the U.S. Court of Appeals in Washington, D.C.
“With all due regard to national security, we're deeply concerned that the rules appear to permit taking away a pilot's license without an independent review,” said Phil Boyer, president of the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association, which represents about 60 percent of the nation's 630,000 pilots, including noncommercial pilots.
Capt. Duane Woerth, president of the Air Line Pilots Association, the nation's largest commercial-pilot union, said the rules cross the line from security-related concerns to “secretive, unaccountable government conduct.”
“Pilots and other workers would be unable to invoke the traditional right to access and refute the information that is being used against them,” Woerth said.

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