AIBU to judge passengers complaining about grounded flights on 9/11?

The hand luggage liquid ban (total ban initially, then reduced to the size limit of 100mls that is still in place today), didn’t start until August 2006 and was due to a completely different failed terrorist attack relating to a plan to use liquid explosives disguised as fizzy drinks to blow up a number of transatlantic flights travelling between Heathrow and various destinations across the US/Canada.

I remember it clearly as I was in India with work at the time, due to fly back to Heathrow. The company I worked for would not let me or my boss fly back into London until they knew all was safe but our visas were due to expire so we needed to leave imminently. In the end they agreed we could fly to Paris, stay overnight and fly in to Manchester the next day instead, then make onward travel home from there.

So I ended up spending a wonderful, romantic evening in Paris with my very gay boss! We had a lovely dinner at the Buddha Bar and some drinks in the bar at Hotel Costes (where we saw a very well known French Premier League footballer having cosy and intimate drinks with a woman who was not his wife). When compared with the alternative of overstaying our visa and having to spend some time in an Indian jail, I can’t really complain!

As far as 9/11 goes, it’s the Kennedy assassination for the millennial generation- you remember exactly where you were when you heard the news and watched the TV footage of the planes hitting the towers and everything that followed. Sadly even horrific tragedies don’t stop some people being entirely self absorbed and primarily focused on what the implications are for them, rather than the actual victims involved.

Been some time since I last watched but as I recall, I think the majority of the people featured in the show weren’t exactly what you’d consider the pinnacle of UK society. In fact, with quite a few of them, I wouldn’t have been shocked to see them appear as guests on Jeremy Kyle. If in doubt, please just watch the episode with the family from Runcorn who are flying to a destination wedding in the Dominican Republic, with the bride and groom who are childhood sweethearts……and first cousins! 🤢

It was odd altogether - I was on one of the first flights to America after us airspace
re-opened and I remember everyone clapped and cheered the staff when the plane landed.
i know this is common in some cultures but is not experienced it int he Us before. I also went to Disneyland which was very quiet.
the castle was closed for security reasons after I visited. I also remember pro American T-shirts being sold and worn everywhere.

Worked for an airline that had a US partner (fortunately not affected). I made an on the day decision to refund travel for anyone who was due to be travelling for the following few days.

Later we got a complaint about airport screening and how it wasn’t white people who should be screened, because it was the people in wee Willy winky outfits that needed scrutiny.

There were no shoe checks in 1986. I think you're thinking of Anne-Marie Murphy. The bomb wasn't in her shoe. It was in a suitcase given to her by her fiance who was a Jordanian national.

Shoe checks came in 2006.

I'm an airline security manager. We base our security on "lessons from the past" so this stuff is my bread and butter.

It’s strange isn’t it. I was working that day doing a restaurant shift in a busy hotel , and I’d left my phone on silent. It wasn’t until I arrived home I realised I had a voicemail from a friend (cabin crew) in New York telling me he was ok . He managed to call me and I had no idea what had happened until he told me to turn on the tv . It still blows my mind that nobody at work, customer or staff had seemingly been aware or mentioned it.

If I’d have been in an airport I would have moved heaven and earth to try and get home to my loved ones and yes that would have included berating airport staff if I thought that would get me on a flight.

different situation but my brother got back into New Zealand 24 hours before it shut it’s borders for Covid. If he hadn’t made it he could well have been like others who were stranded unable to get home for months and months.

at the time I thought it was probably the start of a another world war and so they would have added impetus to me trying to get home.

I think you are unreasonable because at the time it was far to much for most people to comprehend straight away. It has never happened before in a way that grounding all flights was necessary and so it was just unimaginable. I don’t think the true horror started to be known for about 24/48 hours for most of us.

Well, I don’t think airspace was closed in Europe like it was in the US? I think the picture was less clear so it was less of a given a flight would be cancelled.

Also Tbf, the ‘we are not in America’ is right.
If the same had happened anywhere else in the world, the whole aviation/sky wouldn’t have been closed to all airlines.

So now look at things from now and know that there was going to be no flights for 3 days (I imagine it took longer fir people to actually be able to get back home)

Would you have wanted to get back home with your family, knowing something big had just happened. Or do you think you’d have been happy to be somewhere else, far away from family. Having to pay for hotel etc… whilst not knowing how long this would all last?

Add the uncertainty, lack of communication, people already at the airport.
And the emotional impact of the event.

Yes and the only way to get updates was really to watch TV or listen to radio, and people didn’t generally have pocket versions of these. The internet existed but crashed everywhere due to demand.

Ah yes! I am conflating events there. That was a frightening incident in 2006,
not sure how I could have forgotten it. I am obviously getting old; I went to a high school
open evening a few years back and the history department had a display on ‘key events in history’ - 911 was up there with ww1 and ww2! I felt like a dinosaur especially as the teacher said he wasn’t born when 9 11 happened 😂

People actually took it more seriously/showed more care than they do about terrible events today, in general. I'm not saying everyone, obviously, including the ones you point out. But there wasn't as much immediate victim blaming/joking, probably because social media didn't exist.
I don't know if you would get Radio 1 DJs discussing whether it was ok/respectful to go to nightclubs the weekend after, for example.

My workplace had a big TV in a central atrium and reception had it permanently turned to BBC news. All of the internet news sites, and some others, were down so if we didn't go downstairs to watch we didn't know what was going on.

It was like something out of a Die Hard film and unbelievable that it was real.

I’ve written about this before on MN.

I worked abroad during 9/11. Watched a plane hit on the news and then
Knew we’d be called for an emergency meeting.

We were and went to the airport to meet a whole load of planes headed for Mexico that were grounded in the country.

Most people were understanding and gracious (many honey Mooners) and took their 5* hotel and waited for information about what would happen next.

I woman was walking through the hotel complaining that she didn’t have any underwear for the following day and only had the thing she was wearing.

There were shops literally over the road!

More importantly there were people falling and leaping from 2 burning buildings halfway around the world.

Luckily a number of people gave her some home truths because professionally we werent allowed to!

The liquids ban came in and was sustained however I don’t recall

The liquid ban had nothing to do with 9/11. That started in 2006 after the transatlantic bombing plot, involving hydrogen peroxide bombs that were to be assembled in planes after being carried on in drinks bottles, mixed with Tang powder to make it look like Lucosade.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2006_transatlantic_aircraft_plot

I was in London that day aged 20 and had never heard of the World Trade Center. I didn't have a clue what it meant that a plane had hit.

I remember clearly getting the paper on the way home (remember the second pressing?), think it might have been the evening standard and there were pictures of it in that, but that was London, I don't think other papers did a second press. I can well imagine people travelling would not have known he news or understood why flights were grounded because of a crash in the USA. Horrible behaviour isn't excusable of course but it was a very different time and news was not accessible like it is now.

Honestly I didn’t think it was real and made some inappropriate comment before the actual situation sunk in.

Having seen customers still wanting to be served when staff are dealing with another customer who has fainted, nothing surprises me. People are very selfish sometimes

YABU, we really didnt have so much up to date info then. I was at school and told "a plane hit a tower" but to me that meant the control tower! It wasnt until the 6pm news that I learned it was a terrorist attack

YABU. You’re judging them because you’re so used 24/7 news and social media, you’ve forgotten it wasn’t normal back then. The scale of 9/11 was also incomprehensible in the moment. until you saw it on the news, that I genuinely think a lot of people didn’t realise what had actually occurred.

Don't judge.

We once were caught up in a big train disruption.

There was a lady making a huge fuss about getting the train and we all rolled our eyes and thought how self important as we were all stuck.
Anyway I got talking to her and turned out it was a genuinely life or death situation and she needed to get to a hospital within a fixed time schedule.

They got her a taxi and hopefully she got there in time.

We had shoe checks after 1986. Flight out of Heathrow with a pregnant girlfriend with a bomb in the shoe heel.