17 thoughts on “Odds of being a victim of airborne terrorism”
so as long as you don’t fly from Muscoda, WI to Egypt with a layover on Neptune during a lightning storm you will be ok.
on a side note the latest terror attacker had a bomb in his underwear.
after the shoe bomber we had to put our shoes on the x-ray belt. do we now have to put our underwear on the x-ray belt if so do we really want to see the average American striped down to go through the metal detector.
Im pretty safe,I have never been on a plane
I’m sure all those statistics would have been a comfort to the families of those killed by the underwear bomber if he would have been a little more careful.
the security systems did not prevent that tragedy, the bombers stupidity did.
Think about that when considering all the statistics.
tim
Safe until the next lightning storm anyway.
All the terrorists have to do is spent a couple hundred dollars on an air ticket, stuff a dollar’s worth of explosive down some schmuck’s underwear, and send him off.
The reaction in the United States is to spend BILLIONS of dollars we do not have to counter this idiocy while treating its citizens and the traveling public like cattle going to the slaughter.
And to what end?
The obvious REAL solution is to target extra security measures on ARAB passengers ( the REAL terrorists!), instead of every 85 year-old grandma from Middle America.
I’m glad to see that more and more folks are catching on to the stupidity of the TSA and Homeland Security. The only thing accomplished is pi$$ing off the traveling public.
I have to say, I’m getting really really annoyed by all these internet math-gods who insist on comparing the probability of a lightning strike, something that is affected by metal around you and atmospheric conditions but is essentially random, with a terrorist attack which has been thought out by a human and is *not* a random act, but presumably aimed at causing maximum destruction.
Not the same thing, people, never the same thing and never comparable.
Just like the odds on this comment having been typed by 1,000,000 monkeys.
In a typical year 191,670 people are raped or sexually assaulted in america out of 304,059,724 people
So your odds are 1 out of 1,586.37 that any given year you will be raped.
“there are lies, damn lies, and statistics.”
Let me go through what is wrong with this. Most plane flights are not the ones that a guy would target for example those little prop planes used for less active routes, so the set of flights is now much smaller. Second, as has been shown over the last few years the law of independent assortment does not apply to terrorism attacks! This always pisses me off. If two events are not independent of each other using traditional statistical methods will not work. You have to bring in the big guns with stuff like baye’s law and condition probability
Its like this: the writer wants us to believe that each killing is inherently random. That the fact that they are clustering is completely random.
I want you to believe this: After the first major attack others become inspired to copy-cat it. Hence the odds are truly higher now than they were before.
But hey maybe i am wrong maybe everything single guy that would do something like that has been living on mars the last decade and hasnt heard about 9-11 yet.
Where the hell did they get the number 647?
Until TSA stops terrorizing little old ladies and starts profiling likely terrorists, then our citizens should continue to hold our Government in contempt.
Sec. of Homeland Security said Sunday not to worry, “everything went according to clockwork”, and “the system worked in this instance”.
So, nothing to see here, everybody move along, get on the plane and shut up about your d@mn security. The Peace Prize winner has it all handled.
Reminds me of a joke. This guy is caught by airline security because he has a bomb in his carry-on bag. They take him to a back room to interrogate him.
“Are you a terrorist?”
“No, I’m not. In fact, I’m preventing terrorism.”
“WTF? How do you figure that?”
“Well, I was reading these statistics the other day on Bits & Pieces about how likely it is that, you know, there’ll be a bomb on a particular plane. However, I’ve also read that the chances that TWO separate people will independently get on the same plane BOTH carrying bombs … well, I … I can’t remember the exact statistic or anything, but it’s simply ridiculously, outrageously, even laughably unlikely. So I figure if I carry a bomb every time I fly, the chances that some terrorist will get on the plane with a bomb are pretty much nil. Ergo, I’m protecting all these people by carrying a bomb onto this plane. Jail? Sir, I should get a medal!”
“Not the same thing, people, never the same thing and never comparable.”
But, that’s not the point of postings like this.
The point is to remind us that air travel is basically very safe, and that the things we take for granted are more likely to cause us harm than the things the media blows up about.
I’m NOT saying the media shouldn’t report this stuff; thay should, and should expose the TSA, etc. for their stupidity.
But Americans, on the whole, tend to overreact to stuff that will not ever affect them personally, and live in fear of stuff that is less likely to happen to them or their loved ones than any number of things.
There’s a line between awareness and paranoia. I refuse to sit in my bathtub crapping my pants in fear of “terrorism” when slipping, falling, and DYING IN MY OWN TUB is much more likely.
We are so quick to judge. While we all live “amongst the masses” we have seen most everything that “one can do to another”. Most of us are “good”, respectful of one another. And so for the few, we are forced to blame on entities/society the absentiesm of empathy for man. We know, we know…. that every day we get out of bed, kiss the kids, teach a class, fix a muffler, feed the dog… this could be our last day. It’s a fact of life, it’s all life. People walk into houses of worship and kill one another, the post office and Wall Street and high school (if you really want to talk about risk.) Some things, you cant fix, be mad, but quit blaming someone else.
Wait! Don’t be printing stuff like this. Conservatives have to be allowed to frighten Americans into voting for them. They have nothing else. I mean, if the we-are-the-ones-who-will-keep-you-safe Republicans had been in charge of the things, 9/11 never would have happ……oh…..hmmmm
Billions and billions of dollars have been spent on T.S.A. and other federal agencies to supposedly “prevent” terrorism but the interesting and ironic FACT is that the last 2 airline bombing attempts (aka, the shoe bomber and crotch bomber) were prevented by PRIVATE American citizens who got nothing but a pat on the back for their bravery!
Thanks for looking out for us Congress!
so as long as you don’t fly from Muscoda, WI to Egypt with a layover on Neptune during a lightning storm you will be ok.
on a side note the latest terror attacker had a bomb in his underwear.
after the shoe bomber we had to put our shoes on the x-ray belt. do we now have to put our underwear on the x-ray belt if so do we really want to see the average American striped down to go through the metal detector.
Im pretty safe,I have never been on a plane
I’m sure all those statistics would have been a comfort to the families of those killed by the underwear bomber if he would have been a little more careful.
the security systems did not prevent that tragedy, the bombers stupidity did.
Think about that when considering all the statistics.
tim
Safe until the next lightning storm anyway.
All the terrorists have to do is spent a couple hundred dollars on an air ticket, stuff a dollar’s worth of explosive down some schmuck’s underwear, and send him off.
The reaction in the United States is to spend BILLIONS of dollars we do not have to counter this idiocy while treating its citizens and the traveling public like cattle going to the slaughter.
And to what end?
The obvious REAL solution is to target extra security measures on ARAB passengers ( the REAL terrorists!), instead of every 85 year-old grandma from Middle America.
I’m glad to see that more and more folks are catching on to the stupidity of the TSA and Homeland Security. The only thing accomplished is pi$$ing off the traveling public.
I have to say, I’m getting really really annoyed by all these internet math-gods who insist on comparing the probability of a lightning strike, something that is affected by metal around you and atmospheric conditions but is essentially random, with a terrorist attack which has been thought out by a human and is *not* a random act, but presumably aimed at causing maximum destruction.
Not the same thing, people, never the same thing and never comparable.
Just like the odds on this comment having been typed by 1,000,000 monkeys.
In a typical year 191,670 people are raped or sexually assaulted in america out of 304,059,724 people
So your odds are 1 out of 1,586.37 that any given year you will be raped.
“there are lies, damn lies, and statistics.”
Let me go through what is wrong with this. Most plane flights are not the ones that a guy would target for example those little prop planes used for less active routes, so the set of flights is now much smaller. Second, as has been shown over the last few years the law of independent assortment does not apply to terrorism attacks! This always pisses me off. If two events are not independent of each other using traditional statistical methods will not work. You have to bring in the big guns with stuff like baye’s law and condition probability
Its like this: the writer wants us to believe that each killing is inherently random. That the fact that they are clustering is completely random.
I want you to believe this: After the first major attack others become inspired to copy-cat it. Hence the odds are truly higher now than they were before.
But hey maybe i am wrong maybe everything single guy that would do something like that has been living on mars the last decade and hasnt heard about 9-11 yet.
Where the hell did they get the number 647?
Until TSA stops terrorizing little old ladies and starts profiling likely terrorists, then our citizens should continue to hold our Government in contempt.
Sec. of Homeland Security said Sunday not to worry, “everything went according to clockwork”, and “the system worked in this instance”.
So, nothing to see here, everybody move along, get on the plane and shut up about your d@mn security. The Peace Prize winner has it all handled.
Reminds me of a joke. This guy is caught by airline security because he has a bomb in his carry-on bag. They take him to a back room to interrogate him.
“Are you a terrorist?”
“No, I’m not. In fact, I’m preventing terrorism.”
“WTF? How do you figure that?”
“Well, I was reading these statistics the other day on Bits & Pieces about how likely it is that, you know, there’ll be a bomb on a particular plane. However, I’ve also read that the chances that TWO separate people will independently get on the same plane BOTH carrying bombs … well, I … I can’t remember the exact statistic or anything, but it’s simply ridiculously, outrageously, even laughably unlikely. So I figure if I carry a bomb every time I fly, the chances that some terrorist will get on the plane with a bomb are pretty much nil. Ergo, I’m protecting all these people by carrying a bomb onto this plane. Jail? Sir, I should get a medal!”
“Not the same thing, people, never the same thing and never comparable.”
But, that’s not the point of postings like this.
The point is to remind us that air travel is basically very safe, and that the things we take for granted are more likely to cause us harm than the things the media blows up about.
I’m NOT saying the media shouldn’t report this stuff; thay should, and should expose the TSA, etc. for their stupidity.
But Americans, on the whole, tend to overreact to stuff that will not ever affect them personally, and live in fear of stuff that is less likely to happen to them or their loved ones than any number of things.
There’s a line between awareness and paranoia. I refuse to sit in my bathtub crapping my pants in fear of “terrorism” when slipping, falling, and DYING IN MY OWN TUB is much more likely.
We are so quick to judge. While we all live “amongst the masses” we have seen most everything that “one can do to another”. Most of us are “good”, respectful of one another. And so for the few, we are forced to blame on entities/society the absentiesm of empathy for man. We know, we know…. that every day we get out of bed, kiss the kids, teach a class, fix a muffler, feed the dog… this could be our last day. It’s a fact of life, it’s all life. People walk into houses of worship and kill one another, the post office and Wall Street and high school (if you really want to talk about risk.) Some things, you cant fix, be mad, but quit blaming someone else.
Wait! Don’t be printing stuff like this. Conservatives have to be allowed to frighten Americans into voting for them. They have nothing else. I mean, if the we-are-the-ones-who-will-keep-you-safe Republicans had been in charge of the things, 9/11 never would have happ……oh…..hmmmm
Billions and billions of dollars have been spent on T.S.A. and other federal agencies to supposedly “prevent” terrorism but the interesting and ironic FACT is that the last 2 airline bombing attempts (aka, the shoe bomber and crotch bomber) were prevented by PRIVATE American citizens who got nothing but a pat on the back for their bravery!
Thanks for looking out for us Congress!