For frequent American flyers and puzzled first-time visitors from Europe, a major security headache is due to finally to fade away into history’s rearview mirror.
Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem announced in early July that passengers traveling through domestic airports can keep their shoes on while passing through security screening at TSA checkpoints.
The new policy will increase hospitality for travelers and streamline the TSA security checkpoint process, leading to lower wait times.
In December 2001 onboard a flight from Miami to Paris, Richard Reid, who became known as the “shoe bomber,” tried to ignite hidden explosives in his shoes, which became the impetus for the eventual TSA rule, introduced 5 years later.
“Ending the ‘Shoes-Off’ policy is the latest effort DHS is implementing to modernize and enhance traveler experience across our nation’s airports,” said Secretary Noem.
“We expect this change will drastically decrease passenger wait times at our TSA checkpoints, leading to a more pleasant and efficient passenger experience.”
As well as being a source of traffic in the TSA lines, the last decade and a half has seen the Shoes Off rule become a major source of confusion as well.
In the two decades following the September 11th attacks, countries which had originally adopted the US’ harsh security screening protocols either gradually abandoned them or only parts of them.
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The result was that flying through the Western world became an exercise in disarray, as passengers taking off their shoes would be told to keep them on, only to arrive in another country for a connecting flight and suddenly be told to take them off again.
Presumably most other countries will abandon Shoes Off now that America has, so here’s to shorter airport security lines.
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