AviationTSA would allow knives on planes beginning 25 April

The Transportation Security Administration (TSA) yesterday announced that the prohibition against carrying knives on board would soon be lifted.

The flight attendants union was quick to condemn to move, calling the decision “dangerous” and “designed to make the lives of TSA staff easier, but not make flights safer.”

Fox News reports that the changes were announced by TSA administrator John Pistole during an aviation conference in New York.

The new measure would mean that starting 25 April, passengers going through U.S. airports can bring on board Swiss Army-type knives — specifically, ones with blades no longer than 2.36 inches.

Air Transportation World reports that Pistole told the audience that TSA screeners at the Los Angeles International Airport alone seized forty-seven such knives a day over the last three months of 2012.

“Frankly, I don’t want TSA agents to be delayed by these,” he said.

TSA says the changes were made as part of its “overall risk-based security approach” and to align with the international standards and those of the EU.

TSA would also allow other items banned since 9/11, such as lacrosse sticks, ski poles, and small, souvenir baseball bats.

In an angry statement, Stacy K. Martin, president of Southwest Airlines’ Flight Attendants Union, TWU Local 556, said in a the decision should be “immediately rescinded.”

“While we agree that a passenger wielding a small knife or swinging a golf club or hockey stick poses less of a threat to the pilot locked in the cockpit, these are real threats to passengers and flight attendants in the passenger cabin,” she said.

Fox News notes that even under the new measure, box-cutter type knives used by the 9/11 hijackers are still prohibited. Razors as well as knives with molded grips also are still banned.