Yesterday I received news of the U.S. electronics ban and this morning, I woke up taken aback by another piece of news – Britain to follow US with ban on electronic devices on flights from Muslim countries in Middle East.
Unlike the 13 countries that the US has issued this blanket ban except American carriers, the UK’s decision only affects six predominantly-muslim countries.
The six countries affected are:
Turkey, Lebanon, Jordan, Egypt, Tunisia and Saudi Arabia.
Devices measuring more than 16cm in length, 9.3cm in width, or 1.5cm depth will be banned from the cabin and need to be placed into hold luggage and checked-in before going through security. This measure was known to be effective immediately.
The funny thing is US’ ban does not apply to American carriers but UK’s ban requires all carriers (including BA) to comply.
There were rumours that the move to ban electronics on certain flights were purely political – as a way to protect American carriers from losing out to the Middle-Eastern carriers. However, others argue from a security point of view regarding an incident last year appears to have caused particular alarm.
al-Shabaab smuggled an explosive-filled laptop on a flight out of Mogadishu and the bomb was particularly placed by the extremist so as to blow a hole in the side of the passenger cabin albeit a small one. Experts commented that if the explosion occurred at a higher altitude, it would be disastrous as the explosion will be bigger due to the pressurised cabin.
Whatever the (main) reasons behind the #electronicsban, I certainly do hope that it is not politically motivated. The Middle-Eastern carriers are just so much better than the American carriers in terms of – everything. Look, let this truth be told, if American carriers could match the foreign carriers in terms of their service offerings, they would not be in such a pathetic state now – having to stop foreign carriers from entering the market in order to protect their jobs.
