Winging It Through Airlines in Wartime

As a reporter on the transportation beat, I tell myself that flying is safer than my daily, nerve-racking commute to work on the San Diego Freeway. But that wasn’t very comforting during an overseas trip in the midst of the Gulf War.

The trip to see my daughter, who is attending school in Italy, was complicated by the threat of terrorism. Although I did not cover the bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 over Scotland, I had seen something similar: burned body parts littering the site of the Aeromexico crash in Cerritos. I’m haunted by that image every time I get on an airplane.

My wife and I worried about flying together instead of separately. On the advice of an attorney, we made out our wills--a subject of procrastination for 18 years of marriage. As three co-workers signed the document as my witnesses, I joked nervously that I was really having them buy shares in an Iraqi Scud missile factory.

Having written about botched airport security before, I was disappointed that we were able to get through LAX without having to open our suitcases for a hand search. But I grinned happily when we were asked whether someone had handed us anything to take aboard the aircraft.

No sooner had we pulled away from the gate than the pilot informed us that we would have to redock. A couple headed for St. Louis was on the wrong plane. A man had misplaced his wife and daughter somehow and had left them behind. A bulky, sharped-tongued New Yorker nearly punched out a mild-looking businessman when the New Yorker commandeered an entire row in order to lay down. Worse, some luggage already aboard the aircraft could not be matched by the airline’s computer with any passenger on our flight--a big security risk.

This did not build confidence. Being stupid enough to continue on this flight, I thought, might not look good on a resume.

Things did not improve when we switched planes in New York. After we pulled away from the gate, the airline once again concerned itself with some strange luggage. Names were called. One man did not respond, and so his luggage was removed from the belly of the jetliner.

We taxied toward the runway, then stopped again. This time, the pilot said he had to file a new flight plan to avoid bad weather. But it was at least partly a cover story. Outside my window I could see a baggage cart being brought alongside the plane for the second time. More baggage was removed, without explanation.

We left New York about 90 minutes late. Not bad, I thought, considering the stories I’ve written about lengthy flight delays because of fog, runway accidents and even a flooded aircraft lavatory.

In Rome, we were greeted by battle-garbed soldiers toting machine guns. It reminded me of the tanks I saw in Athens after the military coup in Greece, years earlier. We were asked not only for our passports but for our boarding passes. Some passengers had thrown their seat stubs away and dug for their airline ticket receipts.

There were heavily armed militia at the front of my daughter’s school and a police unit in the rear because of the concentration of Americans there. A guard challenged me when I photographed the school. He’s in the photo. Later, we had to vouch for a school staff member who forgot to bring her security pass.

And unlike in Los Angeles, our baggage was opened and hand-searched before our return flight. I underwent a body search. Comically, the guard tried to show me what he wanted me to do by raising his arms like wings. In Italian he asked for the English word that would explain the situation. “Search,” I said. He repeated it three times.

And so, far away from the troops in Kuwait, the Gulf War had affected my life, even if only superficially. And far from being bothered by the extra security, it increased my comfort level.

But such measures only go so far. My wife’s wallet was stolen near the railroad station in Florence.