[Philmont]: FYI - Butane lighters banned from airliners

>From cnn.com

Matt Cole
SM, Troop 32, Bedington, WV
Advisor, 2004 727-N
PTC 2004

Butane lighters banned from airliners

December 9, 2004
WASHINGTON (AP) -- Passengers already are barred from
smoking on commercial flights. Now they won't be
allowed to bring their butane lighters on board
either.

As part of the intelligence reform bill passed
Wednesday, Congress added the lighters to the long
list of items, including scissors, pen knives and box
cutters, that passengers are barred from carrying on
to planes. The ban does not apply to checked luggage.

Democratic Sens. Ron Wyden of Oregon and Byron Dorgan
of North Dakota had pushed for the change for more
than a year after learning the Transportation Security
Administration allowed them on planes.

"When I found out that they had explicitly, in their
rule, said you could take two butane lighters and four
books of matches on board, I thought, 'What have they
been drinking?"' Dorgan said. Matches still are
allowed.

Dorgan cited FBI reports that would-be "shoe-bomber"
Richard Reid would have been able to ignite his
explosive and blow up a trans-Atlantic jetliner three
years ago if he'd brought a butane lighter with him.

Wyden and Dorgan were so persistent in their campaign
against the incendiary devices that Sen. John McCain,
R-Arizona, joked earlier this year that he never
thought butane lighters would get so much attention.

"This is probably not the biggest thing in the world,"
Dorgan said. "But it's one of those areas where a big
government agency couldn't develop a little bit of
common sense about something so obvious."

The ban takes effect 60 days after President Bush
signs the intelligence reform bill into law.

                
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Received on Thu Dec 9 19:40:48 2004