What were airports like pre 9 11?

[Ninapertree]

I'm in the airport getting a flight and its taking ages. Ages through the security queue. Then i got patted down. Ages through the boarding queue.

My mum said "do you remember the old days before 9 11, when airports were much easier to get through".

I cant remember. I was 16 when 9 11 happened and I think i only flew a few times before 9 11. I asked my mum and she cant remember specificially but she remembers it being easier and quicker to get through.

What were they like back then. I'm interested. Was security different?

If it wasn't a busy time, like summer holidays, check-in and security could be mich quicker. I remember rocking up to the check-in desk at Brussels Airport in the late 90s about 40 minutes before my flight was due to depart because my train had been delayed. Still managed to get on the flight.

It was very different then though because people didn’t take as much crap with them as hand luggage. The evolution of “low cost” carriers who then bill everything as an add on e.g. checking in a suitcase has totally changed that. In the 90s it was seriously uncool to have a wheeled hand baggage case. Most people just had a small hold-all (which is why there weren’t any issues with getting everything into an overhead locker, either). People also didn’t travel as much just for a weekend break, so everyone did check in a bag.
Boarding passes were handwritten. Oh the excitement of a printed boarding card and the wow factor one the magnetic strip was introduced.
Tickets were also handwritten on carbon copy paper. I’ve always wondered how the central list was maintained with travel agents all over the country selling tickets for the same flights and then writing them out.

Security could be slow. I remember in about 1990 before a 14 hour flight being asked to explain why I was carrying about 10 AA batteries. For my Walkman, of course to make it last. The inflight entertainment consisted of Mr Bean on a giant screen which I was too short to see. That and various awful musk channels on loop. I also once just, in the Nick of time, managed to stop a security man from opening the film latch on my 35mm camera beach’s he wanted to see what was inside and a colleague had to explain they couldn’t do that or the light would wipe my photos.

And smoking on planes was definitely a thing until the late 90s, at least.

Adults too. Me and OH were "invited" into the cockpit in a flight to Jamaica in 1995! Several couples/families went in. Not the only time I saw it either - it was pretty common in the 90s.

Airports were also a lot quicker/easier to navigate through. I also remember you could go deeper into the airports, i.e. at Manchester you could go through to a "shopping area" where there was a Boots, WHS, Tie Rack and other shops, and a cafe, without a passport nor boarding card, with the security/passport control being further inside the airport after the main shopping area after which you went through duty free and then into the main departure areas. There was also a viewing area you could access from the main shopping area too, again without a boarding pass/passport/security check. We went a few times as part of a "day trip" to the area and would go in for a drink/snack, and to watch the planes, and I remember buying a bikini from one of the shops, all on occasions we weren't flying anywhere. Now, the security/boarding pass checks are a lot closer to the main entrances so you basically can't get any further than the check in area with no passport or boarding pass.

Many happy memories of heading to the cockpit to sit on the captain's knee and get my "Young Flyer's passport" stamped.
The cigarette smoke was awful.

My Dad was once in a queue at JFK and was apologetically told that the flight had been overbooked and he had been moved to a different plane. He was travelling a lot and resignedly asked when he could actually travel......to be told he was flying Concord. They were all taken to the cockpit, given a silver plated photo frame and stationary set. He said that he felt about 6 yrs old!

Temporary passports were definitely a thing until some point in the 80s.

The big change post 9/11 was no bladed items then liquids. Massive change in the US where national flights were likened to catching a bus prior to that.

Post 9/11, I remember flying to the EU for meetings and going to the supermarket there to buy 6 bottle of wine, for my wine bottle grocery bag, and carrying them on the plane to go under my seat…instead of £10 for cheap plonk, I was spending £5 on nice bottles. And NOT duty free prices. I left that job in 2006.

In 1996 I was flying back from LA with my mum and dad and it turned out I knew one of the cabin crew. She arranged for me and my Dad to sit on the jump seats in the cockpit for the landing at dawn. It was an utterly incredible experience which a non pilot will never ever get to experience again!

In 1997 when going on a girls holiday my sister was really chatted up by the guy on the passport desk. Where was she going? How long for? Who was she travelling with? I remember giggling about it at the time and telling her that she’d pulled.

We had the holiday and were waiting to be picked up to go back to the airport and were swapping with a group of lads we had met and laughing at the passport photos.

We stopped laughing when one of the lads pointed out that my sister’s passport had expired in 1996!!! 🤨

We spoke to the rep who had no idea what to do 🙄
So went to the airport fully expecting her to be turned away… nope, got on the plane no problem.

Then expected to be caught at the UK border when we landed. Nope. Sailed straight through in a pool of nervous sweat straight to baggage claim.

I often wonder if the guy on passport control on the way out had spotted the out of date passport, hence the extra questions and kindly let her travel so she didn’t miss her holiday?

Thank you mystery border control man! 🙌

1970’s BA (BAOC) ran a junior jet club for under 18’s on board. We had “log books” and would visit the cockpit to have the pilot sign our log of miles flown.

Happy Days.

but then, I wasn’t paying for the flights. Pre Freddy Laker there were no discounts , flights were expensive and roughly the same across airlines.

I’m confused about the smoking ban because dropped a lit cigarette on a long haul flight causing a right kerfuffle. My husband was with me, and we only met in 2003 so it was after that. Perhaps it wasn’t a European airline.

We literally had to pop our bags onto the conveyor outside the plane - could have put anything in there. Travelling in Africa in the 90s.

Not the airport but the plane - I always used to hit up the cabin crew for the jump seat in the cockpit - for landing. That stopped quick smart after 9.11.

Took whatever you wanted in hand baggage (apart form obvious stuff like knives or explosives, and according to permitted weights and sizes). There was still security but not half as intense.

We also hadn't realised we could put wheels on our suitcases so we had to lug them all by hand.

ISTR children were put on their mum's passport as well?

On board, passengers were routinely allowed into cockpits mid flight, just by asking nicely. I went in during a night flight and it remains one of the most magical memories of my life.

I also remember walking right up to the wheel of a 747 to see how big it was, although that was a LONG time ago.

Smoking and non-smoking was separated by a curtain.

Entertainment was the same movie for everyone on a communal screen and you liked it or lumped it.

You could smoke throughout the plane in the late 60s to early 70s….
Then they changed it to the back of the plane only.
You could light up when the seatbelt sign went off, and order your drink then too.

In the 90s I worked with the wife of a senior BA pilot. She worked P/T and would often come in after a weekend away somewhere exotic because her DH could get the jump seat for her.

They let Kevin's family run onto a plane to Paris without checking passports or even counting them. And a year later they let Kevin fly to NYC unaccompanied and not on the passenger list for that flight so pretty slack I reckon.

On a serious not can't remember the queues being as long but I do remember being able to smoke on the plane!

We were but there was a massive delay in the air and lots of children. I was really surprised.

And drinks were free with the major airlines like BOAC/BA. AS was a meal, two if it was long haul. And sometimes snacks too.
I also remember when they came round before take-off with boiled sweets for you to suck during take-off and climbing. Including barley sugars.

Metal cutlery on planes before 9/11.

I few United in October 2001 right after 9/11 and was served a pizza to eat with the most wobbly, bendy cutlery it was like something from a joke shop.

The first time DH and I went abroad together, around 2002/03 you could take whatever liquids you wanted on the plane in your hand luggage. We were in Benidorm and bought a cheap holdall from a market stall and then filled it with all the off brand Spanish booze and fags we could fit in it. DH had a job lifting it into the overhead compartment, there must have been at least 20 bottles in there.

I flew lots as a child and teenager, was a member of BOAC’s Junior Jet Club, we got a log book you could take up to the cockpit to get your flight logged and signed by the Captain. And a smart metal ‘Wings’ badge.

Have to say if that was really was you describe -i.e. in the air, and I think you said with a UK airline then it might be something to swiftly forget you ever saw...

It would be way outside anything allowable in the UK regs.....

🤷🏻‍♀️ dd1&3 loved it.

Flying domestically was quite different. Flew Liverpool - London in 1998 and it was like getting on a coach. We walked up a ramp to a seating area, waited for the plane door to open and walked on (though they did check tickets as we got on). At the other end we walked off and walked straight out without any "No return" barriers. Same with domestic flights in the US, walk on walk off, plus anyone could walk into the gate area so could family etc. could meet you when you walked off your plane.

Internationally it was reasonably similar but security was a little less full on. The scanners were less hi-tech, you could take a bottle of water and whatever toiletries you liked through (and folding knives with blades under 10 cm) and they pulled fewer people out to double check. In some places now you still have to show id again when you get on the plane, you never had to do that before. In the US you could fly to/from Mexico, Canada and the Caribbean with just your driver's license. In the UK, if you couldn't afford or didn't want the hassle of getting a proper passport you could get a 1 year visitor's passport instantly at the post office (these might have been stopped before 9/11, though).

@TeenLifeMum

Glad the kids enjoyed it but as an example this character pushed his luck too far and got sacked for allowing flight deck access to a VIP despite the flight being a private charter...

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/7953069.stm#:~:text=An%20airline%20pilot%20sacked%20for,on%20a%20flight%20from%20Finland

You picked your visitors passport up at the post office in your lunch hour. I've still got a couple from trips to Italy. They were a pinky/beige coloured card folded into three. They weren't allowed after 1995.

I was flying constantly for work around the time of 9/11. Every airport duty free in the world had a Victorinox (Swiss knives) shop - they were like Sunglass hut today. Obviously their business model got destroyed by the new rules on blades and they all shut down.

My BF at the time liked pocket knives, not the weapon type but the French artisan style. I often flew back to my home country with a new Opinel or Laguiole for him in my handbag. No one batted an eyelid.

The demand for long haul air travel was so dire after 9/11 that BA repeatedly ran a promotion, whereby if you booked a business class ticket between London and North America, they would give you two free economy tickets anywhere in the world. It was a bonanza for people like me who flew on clients’ accounts several times a month. It took me years to go through my free tickets.