And so Open Air Transport draws to a close

2 Canadian boys with same name land on no-fly list


Two boys named Alistair Butt, one from Saskatchewan and one from Ontario, were stopped while trying to board flights last week because their name matches a name that appears on a no-fly list.
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Transport Canada won't confirm if the boys are on a United States no-fly list, an airline no-fly list or Canada's new no-fly list, which went into effect on June 18.

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The list is not available to the public, which means those on it will only find out when they try to travel.


We had a good run. What was it, 80 years from the first plane being invented to now ? But it's over. Airplanes now cover the entire world. And that , unfortunately means , that if anyone in the entire world decides to take a wack at their enemey , putting somone on a plane and sending them over to hijack the plane (with a carpet knife or some other sharp object that would normally pass security ) is just a cheap and efficient means if you don't care about the hijacker surviving.

I just did a search on sax.flightcentre.ca , and they charge 1900$Cnd and report it takes 12 hours to go from Ottawa to Beirut.

No fly lists by other countries deciding who they're going to let in is just the beginning. Soon it will be white lists of only specific people allowed to fly , only couriers for example. The days of getting the family together and getting on the plane are probably over , as this one family found out the hard way.

From the terrorist point of view it's just a wonderful thing. The airplane is a hundred million dollar investment by your enemy, and it probably has upwards of 200 victems on it , even if you miss your primary target you're still guarenteed a good fall out of dead bodies.

The Airlines , of course, are up the creek without a paddle. They're now saddled with a hundred million dollar plane that if they're too free in selling tickets , they lose the plane. Oh they try to shift it all onto others, the government , insurence , etc , and then sell tickets like crazy , but a hundred mil a pop is too heavy a load for anyone , any goverment , to float. Especially over and over again. And thats just the financial aspect , never mind the bodies falling out of the sky.

International flights are now toast, aside from a few privately chartered planes run by companies for internal use only. I suspect a new industry of smaller planes that only fly inside one country and don't cross any borders will rise out of this, but the days of hopping on a plane to the other side of the world are pretty much drawing to a close. One or two more hijackings and that's pretty much going to put the final nail in that coffin.