List of Airports Where TSA Is Expanding PreCheck

The T.S.A. appears to be serious about this excellent plan to significantly expand access to the PreCheck trusted traveler program that reduces hassles at the checkpoints for those who qualify.

PreCheck started out in a phase many considered to be obnoxious -- that is, it was open only to the highest-spending elite customers "invited" by participating airlines. But it's since been expanded to encompass a much bigger segment of the general flying population, including those who belong to the popular Global Entry program of the Customs and Border Protection agency, which provides easier reentry into the U.S., allowing members to breeze through immigration and customs without waiting in those Ellis Island-like lines. And the T.S.A. is also starting up its own opt-in PreCheck program, which it has described as a kind of "Global Entry lite."

So far so good, right?

So here's the T.S.A.'s announcement in full, with the list of airports:

Press Release

TSA Pre✓™ Expands to 60 Additional Airports

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Wednesday, September 4, 2013

More Passengers Able to Experience Expedited Screening

WASHINGTON — The Transportation Security Administration (TSA) announced today that it will expand its TSA expedited screening program to 60 new airports in addition to the existing 40, bringing the total number of airports with TSA Pre✓™ to 100. These airports are expected to have TSA Pre✓™ lanes at select checkpoints by the end of the year.

The agency also will expand the number of TSA Pre✓™ lanes and availability at the existing 40 airports in the coming weeks.

TSA Pre✓™ is an expedited screening program that allows pre-approved airline travelers to leave on their shoes, light outerwear and belt, keep their laptop in its case and their 3-1-1 compliant liquids/gels bag in a carry-on in select screening lanes. To date, more than 15 million passengers have experienced TSA Pre✓™ since it launched in October 2011.

“As TSA continues to move away from a one-size-fits-all approach to transportation security, we are looking for more opportunities to provide the most effective security in the most efficient way possible,” said TSA Administrator John S. Pistole. “Expanding TSA Pre✓™ to more locations enables many more passengers across the country to experience expedited screening.”

Passengers who are eligible for TSA Pre✓™ include U.S. citizens of frequent traveler programs invited by participating airlines. Additionally, U.S. citizens who are members of a U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) Trusted Traveler program and Canadian citizens who are members of CBP’s NEXUS program qualify to participate. Later this year TSA will launch an application program, allowing more U.S. citizens to enroll in TSA Pre✓™.

Eligible passengers traveling on Alaska Airlines, American Airlines, Delta Air Lines, Hawaiian Airlines, United Airlines, US Airways and Virgin America may receive expedited screening benefits. JetBlue and Southwest are expected to begin participating when operationally ready.

If a passenger is eligible for expedited screening, a TSA Pre✓™ indicator will be embedded in the barcode of the boarding pass so that when scanned at the checkpoint, the passenger may be referred to a TSA Pre✓™ lane.  Many participating airlines already print a TSA Pre✓™ indicator directly on the boarding pass so passengers will know in advance they have been cleared for expedited screening. TSA will always incorporate random and unpredictable security measures throughout the airport. No individual will be guaranteed expedited screening.

Travelers can check the TSA Pre✓™ Participating Airports page for information on locations and hours of active TSA Pre✓™ lanes.

The Transportation Security Administration (TSA) was created in the wake of September 11, 2001, to strengthen the security of the nation’s transportation systems and ensure the freedom of movement for people and commerce. Today, TSA secures the nation’s airports and screens all commercial airline passengers and baggage. TSA uses a risk-based strategy and works closely with transportation, law enforcement and intelligence communities to set the standard for excellence in transportation security. TSA’s workforce comprises approximately 50,000 frontline officers who screen approximately 1.8 million travelers each day at more than 450 airports nationwide. For more information about TSA, please visit our website at www.tsa.gov.

Upcoming TSA Pre✓™ locations

An asterisk denotes a current TSA Pre✓™ location. Once new TSA Pre✓™ locations are active, they will be listed on the TSA Pre✓™ Participating Airports page.

Alabama:

Birmingham-Shuttlesworth International Airport

Alaska:

Ted Stevens Anchorage International Airport*

Arizona:

Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport*
Tucson International Airport

Arkansas:

Bill and Hillary Clinton National Airport (Little Rock)

California:

Bob Hope Airport (Burbank)
Fresno Yosemite International Airport
John Wayne Airport (Orange County)*
Long Beach Airport
Los Angeles International Airport*
Oakland International Airport
Ontario International Airport
Sacramento International Airport
San Diego International Airport
San Francisco International Airport*
San Jose International Airport

Colorado:

Colorado Springs Airport
Denver International Airport*

Connecticut:

Bradley International Airport (Hartford)

Florida:

Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport*
Jacksonville International Airport
Miami International Airport*
Orlando International Airport*
Palm Beach International Airport (West Palm Beach)
Pensacola International Airport
Southwest Florida International Airport (Fort Myers)
Tampa International Airport*

Georgia:

Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport*
Savannah/Hilton Head International Airport

Guam:

Antonio B. Won Pat International Airport (Hagåtña)

Hawaii:

Honolulu International Airport*
Kahului Airport
Kona International Airport
Lihue Airport

Idaho:

Boise Airport

Illinois:

Chicago Midway International Airport
Chicago O'Hare International Airport*

Indiana:

Indianapolis International Airport*

Iowa:

Des Moines International Airport

Kansas:

Wichita Mid-Continent Airport

Kentucky:

Louisville International Airport

Louisiana:

Louis Armstrong New Orleans International Airport

Maine:

Portland International Jetport

Maryland:

Baltimore/Washington International Thurgood Marshall Airport*

Massachusetts:

Boston Logan International Airport*

Michigan:

Detroit Metropolitan Wayne County Airport*
Gerald R. Ford International Airport (Grand Rapids)

Minnesota:

Minneapolis-Saint Paul International Airport*

Missouri:

Kansas City International Airport
Lambert-St. Louis International Airport*

Nebraska:

Eppley Airfield (Omaha)

Nevada:

McCarran International Airport (Las Vegas)*
Reno-Tahoe International Airport

New Hampshire:

Manchester-Boston Regional Airport

New Jersey:

Newark Liberty International Airport*

New Mexico:

Albuquerque International Sunport

New York:

Albany International Airport
Buffalo Niagara International Airport
Greater Rochester International Airport
John F. Kennedy International Airport (New York City)*
LaGuardia Airport (New York City)*
Syracuse Hancock International Airport
Westchester County Airport

North Carolina:

Charlotte-Douglas International Airport*
Piedmont Triad International Airport (Greensboro)
Raleigh-Durham International Airport*

Ohio:

Akron-Canton Airport
Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport*
Cleveland Hopkins International Airport*
Dayton International Airport
Port Columbus International Airport

Oklahoma:

Tulsa International Airport
Will Rogers World Airport (Oklahoma City)

Oregon:

Portland International Airport*

Pennsylvania:

Philadelphia International Airport*
Pittsburgh International Airport*

Puerto Rico:

Luis Muñoz Marín International Airport (San Juan)*

Rhode Island:

T. F. Green Airport (Providence)

South Carolina:

Charleston International Airport
Greenville-Spartanburg International Airport
Myrtle Beach International Airport

Tennessee:

McGhee Tyson Airport (Knoxville)
Memphis International Airport*
Nashville International Airport*

Texas:

Austin-Bergstrom International Airport*
Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport*
Dallas Love Field
El Paso International Airport
George Bush Intercontinental Airport (Houston)*
San Antonio International Airport
William P. Hobby Airport (Houston)

Utah:

Salt Lake City International Airport*

Virginia:

Norfolk International Airport
Richmond International Airport
Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport*
Washington Dulles International Airport*

Washington:

Seattle-Tacoma International Airport*
Spokane International Airport

Wisconsin:

Dane County Regional Airport (Madison)
General Mitchell International Airport (Milwauke

Text of Justice Department Suit to Block Merger of American Airlines and US Airways

Whoa, I did not see this one coming.

The Justice Department, along with the attorneys general of six states and Washington D.C., sued to block the well-underway $11 billion merger of American Airlines and US Airways, a merger that was driven by US Air, which would have run the combined company. The merger was to have been finalized this month.

Besides asserting that the merger would unacceptably diminish already stressed domestic air service while raising fares, the complaint takes on the fee-bonanza that airlines have been wallowing in -- and if I were in the airline industry (where antitrust law is sometimes openly laughed at), I'd be looking very carefully and warily about the potential future implications of language like this, from the Justice Department announcement today:

"The complaint also alleges that the merger is likely to result in higher ancillary fees, such as fees charged for checked bags and flight changes.  In recent years, the airlines have introduced fees for those services, which were previously included in the price of a ticket. These fees have become huge profit centers for the airlines.  In 2012, domestic airlines generated more than $6 billion in fees from checked bags and flight changes alone.  The legacy carriers often match each other when one introduces or increases a fee, and if others do not match the initiating carrier tends to withdraw the change.  By reducing the number of airlines, the merger will likely make it easier for the remaining carriers to coordinate fee increases, resulting in higher fees for consumers."

Some of the media often present stories like this with brief excerpts, accompanied by speculation and instant interpretation, but without linking to actual texts, in some reflection of 1970s mentality about "space." Hey, gang, space on the Internet is infinite.

So here's a link to the 56-page Justice Department complaint. And below is the full text of the announcement..

****

 Justice Department Files Antitrust Lawsuit Challenging Proposed Merger Between US Airways and American Airlines

Merger Would Result in U.S. Consumers Paying Higher Airfares and Receiving Less Service; Lawsuit Seeks to Maintain Competition in the Airline Industry

The Department of Justice, six state attorneys general and the District of Columbia filed a civil antitrust lawsuit today challenging the proposed $11 billion merger between US Airways Group Inc. and American Airlines’ parent corporation, AMR Corp.  The department said that the merger, which would result in the creation of the world’s largest airline, would substantially lessen competition for commercial air travel in local markets throughout the United States and result in passengers paying higher airfares and receiving less service. 

The Department of Justice’s Antitrust Division, along with the attorneys general, filed a lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, which seeks to prevent the companies from merging and to preserve the existing head-to-head competition between the firms that the transaction would eliminate.  The participating attorneys general are:  Texas, where American Airlines is headquartered; Arizona, where US Airways is headquartered; Florida; the District of Columbia; Pennsylvania; Tennessee; and Virginia.

“Airline travel is vital to millions of American consumers who fly regularly for either business or pleasure,” said Attorney General Eric Holder.  “By challenging this merger, the Department of Justice is saying that the American people deserve better.  This transaction would result in consumers paying the price – in higher airfares, higher fees and fewer choices.  Today’s action proves our determination to fight for the best interests of consumers by ensuring robust competition in the marketplace.”

Last year, business and leisure airline travelers spent more than $70 billion on airfare for travel throughout the United States.   In recent years, major airlines have, in tandem, raised fares, imposed new and higher fees and reduced service, the department said.

“The department sued to block this merger because it would eliminate competition between US Airways and American and put consumers at risk of higher prices and reduced service,” said Bill Baer, Assistant Attorney General in charge of the Department of Justice’s Antitrust Division. “If this merger goes forward, even a small increase in the price of airline tickets, checked bags or flight change fees would result in hundreds of millions of dollars of harm to American consumers.  Both airlines have stated they can succeed on a standalone basis and consumers deserve the benefit of that continuing competitive dynamic.”

American and US Airways compete directly on more than a thousand routes where one or both offer connecting service, representing tens of billions of dollars in annual revenues.  They engage in head-to-head competition with nonstop service on routes worth about $2 billion in annual route-wide revenues.  Eliminating this head-to-head competition would give the merged airline the incentive and ability to raise airfares, the department said in its complaint.

According to the department’s complaint, the vast majority of domestic airline routes are already highly concentrated.  The merger would create the largest airline in the world and result in four airlines controlling more than 80 percent of the United States commercial air travel market. 

The merger would also entrench the merged airline as the dominant carrier at Washington Reagan National Airport, with control of 69 percent of the take-off and landing slots.  The merged airline would have a monopoly on 63 percent of the nonstop routes served out of Reagan National airport.  As a result, Washington, D.C., area passengers would likely see higher prices and fewer choices if the merger is allowed, the department said in its complaint.  Blocking the merger will preserve current competition and service, including flights that US Airways currently offers from Washington’s Reagan National Airport.

The complaint also describes how, in recent years, the major airlines have succeeded in raising prices, imposing new fees and reducing service.  The complaint quotes several public statements by senior US Airways executives directly attributing this trend to a reduction in the number of competitors in the U.S. market:

·          President Scott Kirby said, “Three successful fare increases – [we are] able to pass along to customers because of consolidation.”

·          At an industry conference in 2012, Kirby said, “Consolidation has also…allowed the industry to do things like ancillary revenues…. That is a structural permanent change to the industry and one that’s impossible to overstate the benefit from it.”

·          As US Airways CEO Parker stated in February 2013, combining US Airways and American would be “ the last major piece needed to fully rationalize the industry.” 

·          A US Airways document said that capacity reductions have “enabled” fare increases.

  “The merger of these two important competitors will just make things worse –exacerbating current airline industry trends toward reduced service, increasing fares and increasing passenger fees,” added Baer.  

As the complaint describes, absent the merger, US Airways and American will continue to provide important competitive constraints on each other and on other airlines.  Today, US Airways competes vigorously for price-conscious travelers by offering discounts of up to 40 percent for connecting flights on other airlines’ nonstop routes under its Advantage Fares program. The other legacy airlines – American, Delta and United – routinely match the nonstop fares where they offer connecting service in order to avoid inciting costly fare wars.  The Advantage Fares strategy has been successful for US Airways because its network is different from the networks of the larger carriers. If the proposed merger is completed, the combined airline’s network will look more like the existing American, Delta and United networks, and as a result, the Advantage Fares program will likely be eliminated, resulting in higher prices and less services for consumers. An internal analysis at American in October 2012, concluded, “The [Advantage Fares] program would have to be eliminated in a merger with American, as American’s large, nonstop markets would now be susceptible to reactionary pricing from Delta and United.” And, another American executive said that same month, “The industry will force alignment to a single approach–one that aligns with the large legacy carriers as it is revenue maximizing.”  By ending the Advantage Fares program, the merger would eliminate lower fares for millions of consumers, the department said.

  The complaint also alleges that the merger is likely to result in higher ancillary fees, such as fees charged for checked bags and flight changes.  In recent years, the airlines have introduced fees for those services, which were previously included in the price of a ticket. These fees have become huge profit centers for the airlines.  In 2012, domestic airlines generated more than $6 billion in fees from checked bags and flight changes alone.  The legacy carriers often match each other when one introduces or increases a fee, and if others do not match the initiating carrier tends to withdraw the change.  By reducing the number of airlines, the merger will likely make it easier for the remaining carriers to coordinate fee increases, resulting in higher fees for consumers.

  The department also said that the merger will make coordination easier among the legacy carriers.  Although low-cost carriers such as Southwest and JetBlue offer consumers many benefits, they fly to fewer locations and are unlikely to be able to constrain the coordinated behavior among those carriers.

  American Airlines is currently operating in bankruptcy.  Absent the merger, American is likely to exit bankruptcy as a vigorous competitor, with strong incentives to grow to better compete with Delta and United, the department said. American recently made the largest aircraft order in industry history, and its post-bankruptcy standalone plan called for increasing both the number of flights and the number of destinations served by those flights at each of its hubs.

  The department’s complaint describes US Airways executives’ fear of American’s standalone growth plan as “industry destabilizing.”  The complaint states that US Airways worries that American’s growth plan would cause “others” to react “with their own enhanced growth plans…,” and that the resulting effect would increase competitive pressures throughout the industry.  The department said the merger will allow US Airways’ management to abandon these aggressive growth plans and continue the industry’s current trend toward higher prices and less service.

  The department’s complaint states that executives of both airlines have repeatedly said that they do not need the merger to succeed.  The complaint states that US Airways’ CEO observed in December 2011, that “A[merican] is not going away, they will be stronger post-bankruptcy because they will have less debt and reduced labor costs.”  US Airways’ executive vice president wrote in July 2012, that, “There is NOquestion about AMR’s ability to survive on a standalone basis.”  And, as recently as January 2013, American’s management presented plans that would increase the destinations it serves in the United States and the frequency of its flights, and would position American to compete independently as a profitable airline with aggressive plans for growth.

  AMR is a Delaware corporation with its principal place of business in Fort Worth, Texas.  AMR is the parent company of American Airlines.  Last year American flew more than 80 million passengers to more than 250 destinations worldwide and took in more than $24 billion in revenue.  In November 2011, American filed for bankruptcy reorganization.

  US Airways is a Delaware corporation with its principal place of business in Tempe, Ariz.  Last year US Airways flew more than 50 million passengers to more than 200 destinations worldwide and took in more than $13 billion in revenue.

###

Interpol Also Issues Worldwide Alert

A day after the U.S. State Department issued a worldwide travel alert concerning countries in the Middle East and North Africa, the international police organization Interpol has also issued one, asking its member states for vigilance in sharing information about suspected terrorist activities.

The alerts come after security agencies intercepted unusual levels of electronic communications among Al Qaeda groups indicating that an unspecified attack or attacks were being discussed for the final days of the  Muslim holy month of Ramadan.

Here's the text of the Interpol alert:

LYON, France – Following a series of prison escapes across nine INTERPOL member countries in the past month alone, including in Iraq, Libya and Pakistan, the INTERPOL General Secretariat headquarters has issued a global security alert advising increased vigilance.

With suspected Al Qaeda involvement in several of the breakouts which led to the escape of hundreds of terrorists and other criminals, the INTERPOL alert requests the Organization’s 190 member countries’ assistance in order to determine whether any of these recent events are coordinated or linked.

INTERPOL is asking its member countries to closely follow and swiftly process any information linked to these events and the escaped prisoners. They are also requested to alert the relevant member country and INTERPOL General Secretariat headquarters if any escaped terrorist is located or intelligence developed which could help prevent another terrorist attack.

Staff at INTERPOL’s 24-hour Command and Coordination Centre and other specialized units are also  prioritizing all information and intelligence in relation to the breakouts or terrorist plots in order to immediately inform relevant member countries of any updates.

August is the anniversary of violent terrorist incidents in Mumbai, India and Gluboky, Russia as well as in Jakarta, Indonesia. This week also marks the 15th anniversary of the US Embassy bombings in Nairobi, Kenya and Dar es Salaam, Tanzania in which more than 200 mostly African citizens were killed and 4,000 others injured.

In recent years, terrorist attacks focusing on diplomatic facilities in Afghanistan, Greece, India, Kenya, Libya, Pakistan, Peru, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Tanzania, Turkey and Yemen have also resulted in hundreds of casualties of all nationalities.

The US State Department has also issued a global travel alert in response to credible intelligence suggesting that Al-Qaeda and affiliated organizations continue to plan terrorist attacks between now and 31 August, particularly in the Middle East and North Africa. In addition to the US authorities announcing the one-day closure of more than 20 diplomatic missions on Sunday 4 August, the UK Foreign Office has also confirmed the closure of the British embassy in Yemen on 4 and 5 August.

Here's That New State Department Travel Alert

The usual hysterics in the news media are in a frisson today over a grave wide-ranging travel alert for Muslim countries just issued by the State Department -- and we ought to be able to assess for ourselves what it actually says, rather than the interpretation of what it says from some chronically alarmed dope on an anchor desk. Alas, the media all allude to the alert, and some even provide a few excerpts from it, but almost none actually seem provide the actual text, in full.

Call me cranky, call me skeptical (or call me experienced), but I do not entirely depend on the media  to summarize a text that I should be able to read in full for myself, and which ought to be routinely linked to in any story.

[UPDATE: The New York Times has a heads-up story now saying that the alert came after officials intercepted Al Qaeda electronic communications -- "more than the usual chatter" -- discussing potential terrorist attacks against U.S. interests in the Middle East and North Africa during the final days of the Muslim holy period of Ramadan.]

As to that worldwide alert, on the regular State Department Web site, incidentally, the most current worldwide travel alert posted right now is from February. Today's alert wasn't even posted as of late afternoon. [UPDATE: They finally posted it on Saturday for the general public to see.]

Possibly, the State Department fed Washington journalist insiders with the actual text of today's new alert a lavish breakfast buffet/book fete in Washington at Al Neuharth's hilarious boondoggle/event-venue known as the Newseum. Who knows?

But thanks to a blog in the Wall Street Journal, here is the actual full text of the State Department's elusive new alert. After that, see the list (also published in full on a Journal blog, thank you, WSJ) of American embassies and consulates that are being closed for public business on Sunday in the Muslin world because of an unspecified threat.

As to the media who don't do their readers the favor of linking to the source texts (like the list of closed embassies): Hey, media, stop Bogarting that space, my friends! On the Internet, it's infinite.
 
***

TRAVEL ALERT

The Department of State alerts U.S. citizens to the continued potential for terrorist attacks, particularly in the Middle East and North Africa, and possibly occurring in or emanating from the Arabian Peninsula.  Current information suggests that Al Qaeda and affiliated organizations continue to plan terrorist attacks both in the region and beyond, and that they may focus efforts to conduct attacks in the period between now and the end of August.  This Travel Alert expires on August 31, 2013.

Terrorists may elect to use a variety of means and weapons and target both official and private interests. U.S. citizens are reminded of the potential for terrorists to attack public transportation systems and other tourist infrastructure.  Terrorists have targeted and attacked subway and rail systems, as well as aviation and maritime services.  U.S. citizens should take every precaution to be aware of their surroundings and to adopt appropriate safety measures to protect themselves when traveling.

We continue to work closely with other nations on the threat from international terrorism, including from al Qaeda.  Information is routinely shared between the U.S. and our key partners in order to disrupt terrorist plotting, identify and take action against potential operatives, and strengthen our defenses against potential threats.

We recommend U.S. citizens register their travel plans with the Consular Section of the U.S. Embassy through the State Department’s travel registration website.  We strongly recommend that U.S. citizens Traveling abroad enroll in the Department of State’s Smart Traveler Enrollment Program (STEP).  STEP enrollment  gives you the latest security updates, and makes it easier for the U.S. embassy or nearest U.S. consulate to contact you in an emergency."

***
Embassies and consulates that will be closed on Sunday:

"The Department of State has instructed certain U.S. Embassies and Consulates to remain closed or to suspend operations on Sunday, August 4.  The Department has been apprised of information that, out of an abundance of caution and care for our employees and others who may be visiting our installations, indicates we should institute these precautionary steps. It is possible we may have additional days of closings as well, depending on our analysis.  The U.S. Embassy and Consulate General will be closed on Sunday, August 4.  U.S. citizens requiring emergency assistance in Abu Dhabi should contact the Embassy at (971) (2) 414-2200. Those in Dubai and the Northern Emirates may contact the Consulate General at (971) (4) 309-4000.
The Department, when conditions warrant, takes steps like this to balance our continued operations with security and safety.  However, beyond this announcement we do not discuss specific threat information, security considerations or measures, or other steps we may be taking. 
For further information, we refer you to the Worldwide Caution put out by the Department dated February 19, 2013, repeated below: http://travel.state.gov/travel/cis_pa_tw/pa/pa_4787.html
The following posts normally open on Sunday will be closed on Sunday, August 4.  For further information, please click on the links below."
U.S. Embassy Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates
U.S. Embassy Algiers, Algeria
U.S. Embassy Amman, Jordan
U.S. Embassy Baghdad, Iraq
U.S. Embassy Cairo, Egypt
U.S. Consulate Dhahran, Saudi Arabia
U.S. Embassy Djibouti, Djibouti
U.S. Embassy Dhaka, Bangladesh
U.S. Embassy Doha, Qatar
U.S. Consulate Dubai, United Arab Emirates
U.S. Consulate Erbil, Iraq
U.S. Consulate Jeddah, Saudi Arabia
U.S. Embassy Kabul, Afghanistan
U.S. Embassy Khartoum, Sudan
U.S. Embassy Kuwait City, Kuwait
U.S. Embassy Manama, Bahrain
U.S. Embassy Muscat, Oman
U.S. Embassy Nouakchott, Mauritania
U.S. Embassy Riyadh, Saudi Arabia
U.S. Embassy Sana’a, Yemen
U.S. Embassy Tripoli, Libya

###

Saguaro Graffiti Vandal Arrested, Despite Inept National Park Service

Saguaro National Park is notified that the Tucson cops have cracked the case.

I'm sure that the inept National Park Service rangers based at Saguaro National Park East in Tucson are hoping to salvage some credit today from news that the Tucson police department, which is an actual competent agency, has arrested a suspect in the ugly graffiti defacing of giant saguaro cactuses on the Douglas Spring trail at the park in mid-May.

We'll see to what extent the local media in Tucson let them get away with any hilarious claim by National Park rangers that they behaved in a professional, let alone competent, manner in this case.

Yesterday, the Tucson police arrested a 16-year-old with a history of graffiti vandalism in the city and charged him with felony counts in the National Park incident, in which about 15 saguaros and some rocks and signs were spray-painted with graffiti, including the tag "SOMA," which turns out to mean Society of Mexican Americans, according to the Tucson police officer who made the case, Abel Urzua.

Urzua told a Tucson TV station yesterday that he recognized the tag pattern way back in mid-May, when he saw the photos of the vandalized graffiti "in the paper."

That would be in the Arizona Daily Star, which ran big photos of the vandalism on its front page on May 13, the day after the vandalism was reported along the Douglas Spring trail by a volunteer park ranger. Photos that were taken by me, incidentally.

And therein lies a tale, told here previously.

I was the volunteer ranger who reported the vandalism on Sunday, May 12, when I was on duty at the Douglas Spring trailhead that morning and heard from hikers about the defaced saguaros starting at about a mile up the hilly trail.

I hiked up to investigate, and took photos of the vandalism. While on duty, I also made repeated attempts to alert park officials about the incident. There was no response. Following protocol, I also called 911, and a sheriff's deputy did respond, but told me he had no jurisdiction. Finally, as I was going off duty at noon, I did reach the ranger on duty, Steve Brolyard.

I told Brolyard about the incident, and said I had taken photos and detailed notes. He said he was aware that I had earlier made calls to the Park visitors center, but he expressed no interest in my report. Nor did he express interest in my offer to come by the visitor's center to give them my photos.

Photo by Joe Sharkey

So I told Brolyard that since he evidently wasn't interested, I would instead contact the local media when I went off-duty. He made no objection to that, incidentally.

So later in the afternoon, I sent the photos to the Arizona Daily Star, where I know a few people.  They also called me for a brief interview in which I simply stated the facts as I knew them. I also called a local TV station, KOLD, which sent a reporter and a cameraman out, and I led them up the trail and showed them where the vandalized cactuses were.

The TV report ran that night, and the next day the Star had the story prominently displayed, with my photos, on the front page. As far as I was concerned, I had done my duty as a citizen and as a journalist.

Ah, but as the old saying has it, no good deed goes unpunished! On Monday, park rangers reported to work at the visitors center and, seeing my photos in the paper, they made a poor choice. They went into a defensive crouch and a cover-up, blaming the messenger for publicizing the vandalism rather than doing the smart thing, which would have been to get ahead of the story that they were now a day behind on.

Missed opportunity! Even though they were a day late on the story (which they themselves publicized on Monday), it would have been a splendid opportunity for the Park Service rangers to discuss with the media the effects of budget cutbacks for staffing and maintenance at the National Park Service.

But no, they had to shoot the messenger instead, and decided to cover up the obvious fact that they dropped the ball on the first day. Their concern was: How dare a park volunteer "approach the media" without authorization, as it was put to me by the head ranger a few days later.

Huh? But I am the media, I replied. Over forty years with major news organizations, I said. I never agreed to be muzzled when I signed up as a volunteer, nor would I have considered any such agreement.  And, I pointed out, you guys expressed no interest whatsoever in my report on Sunday, before I did contact the local media.

Photo by Joe Sharkey

During the week, the defensive coverup was led by a ranger named Andy Fisher, who calls herself the "chief interpretation and outreach officer" at Saguaro National Park East, where she is actually the PR flack. So the National Park worthies went after me, instead of the graffiti vandal. The position of the rangers who confronted me during that week was that, one, I had no right to talk to the media; two, my doing so had somehow "impeded" their "investigation" -- an "investigation" that so far had consisted mainly of confronting me; and three, I had somehow failed to follow "procedures" in reporting the incident on Sunday -- even though I made a half dozen phone calls to various Park Service numbers, met with a deputy sheriff at the scene, and spoke personally to the ranger on duty, Brolyard!

Several days of this ridiculousness ensued, and finally I was asked to come in for a "meeting" at the Saguaro National Park East visitor center and staff headquarters on Thursday, with Fisher and with a ranger in charge named Paul Austin. Austin showed up in the conference room wearing a bulletproof vest that he made a ceremony of removing, presumably having determined that I was not a danger. That meeting, I quickly realized, was nothing more than a disciplinary hearing, at which I was expected to recant my actions and promise not to ever "approach the media" again.  After some back and forth on this, I finally walked out of this absurd session in disgust.

The next day, I got a phone call from Ranger Michelle Uhr, who runs the program in which I was proud to be a volunteer mounted ranger. She fired me. "We can't have you representing us as a volunteer anymore," said the hapless Uhr,  a normally pleasant woman who sounded as if she were speaking on the phone to me with a ranger boss glowering over her shoulder.

OK, that's all water under the bridge now -- though I would point out that since that incident, Saguaro National Park East is minus one dedicated volunteer, at a time when basic staffing is at a critical low.

PARK SERVICE FINALLY TAKES ACTION -- Right, they have now put up a stern sign warning future would-be graffiti vandals at the Douglas Spring trailhead. (Photo by Joe Sharkey) 

I do intend to file a Freedom of Information petition and follow up with a magazine article, and have informed "Chief Interpretation and Outreach Officer" Fisher that she is legally required to keep all records of the various encounters the Park Service had with me over this incident. She hasn't responded to that -- though she has falsely maintained in media interviews that I failed to follow some phantom "procedures."

Well, long story short: I'm glad the Tucson Police Department finally cracked the case.

Meanwhile, as the Daily Star reports today, "staffers are still trying to figure out the best way to clean the saguaros, said Andy Fisher, spokeswoman for Saguaro National Park."

Because, as the asinine way the Park Service handled this case shows, all the fatuous PR in the world won't erase a fundamental problem that you fail to address.

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Badwater Ultramarathon: 135 Miles, Death Valley to Mt. Whitney

The fastest runners in the grueling Badwater Ultramarathon road race have been crossing the finish line all day in California, and I'm again astonished that any runner can do this. 

[Here's the update today on the Badwater Web site, which is loaded with information and the results of the 2013 race. The top three were Carlos Alberto Gomes De Sa, from Portugal, who finished in 24:38, followed by Grant Maughan of Australia (24:53 and Oswaldo Lopez of the U.S. (25:49) In all, 80 runners made it to the finish line, the last posting a time of 47:29. The fastest time record ever is 22:51 hours in the men's division and 26:16 in the women's.]

The race famously starts at in Death Valley National Park at Badwater, which is the lowest point in elevation in the western hemisphere. Runners cross the vast sunblasted valley and into the desert, chug over two mountain ranges and end up at the finish line, 135 miles away and 8,360 feet up Mt. Whitney in California, whose summit at 14,505 feet is the highest point in the contiguous United States. Here's some background on the Badwater race.

Of the 100 or so world-class hardcore runners who start the race, more than 80 percent typically finish. and at the finish line, some runners even continue upward on the path to the summit. 

After a recent visit to Death Valley, I spoke with Chris Kostman, the race director, about the Badwater Ultramarathon, which is also called the Badwater 135. The race is sometimes misunderstood, he said.

"It bothers me sometimes when you hear people say these people are insane or have some kind of death wish,” said Kostman, the chief adventure officer at Adventurecorps, a California-based organizer of ultra-endurance sports events that runs the Badwater 135 and many other extreme-challenge sports events. Kostman is himself an endurance athlete. He works as an archeologist, as well.

"Another thing people often think is these people must have a high tolerance for pain or be masochistic or something, but I try to consistently emphasize that people do things like this because they can. It’s like somebody who’s really great at anything, or just really into something."

Really into it, of course. A casual runner isn't going to show up at Death Valley on a 125-degree July day, lace up the sneakers and complete the Badwater 135. (Here's a walk-up article, so to speak, by Dean Karnazes in Runner's World magazine earlier this month.). Death Valley is the site of the highest air temperature ever recorded on earth, 134 degrees on July 10, 1913. Only two weeks ago, the temperature in Death Valley hit 130 degrees.

Before the race, Kostman said, "Ideally they will have spent quite a few weeks heat-training in the sauna

Some come to the Valley a few weeks early to prep, but most don’t have time for that. And then there are always those people who live in Scandinavia or England, who don’t heat train at all and they just fly over and do it."

Still, that doesn't mean casual runners, Kostman said. "The race is an invitational event, we don’t let just anybody in. They have to have completed at least three 100-mile races before you can even aply for our race.  It’s competitive just to get into the event. The people do get in really try hard to rise to the occasion and not blow the opportunity.

"That’s why even though it’s the world’s toughest footrace we still have an 80 percent finishing rate because people do take it seriously. They want to make the most of the event. Nobody wants to go down in history as the person who passed out at the Badwater 135," he said.

Weirdly, the Furnace Creek Ranch, the only lodging open all summer at Death Valley National Park, is thronged in July and August with tourists, many from Germany and elsewhere in Europe, who co9me there expressly to experience the extreme heat. Around the time of the Badwater race, the nearby Furnace Creek Resort also opens up for a week or two to handle the overflow from Badwater.

"We fill the place up," Kostman said. "We bring a lot of people to Death Valley, nearly 100 runners and about 500 crew-members and 50 or more on te race staff, and a few dozen journalists."

"It's July, and Death Valley is going to be very hot, up to 130 degrees.  But the race is 135 miles long. A lot of people focus on the Death Valley part, which is really just the first third of the race. There are three  mountain ranges they go up, including to Whitney portal. I’ve seen far too many articles where they refer to finishing at the foot of Mt. Whitney. But they really go uphill for 13 miles, and 5,600 feet at the end of that road, and 8,640 feet to the finish line. So during the race, there can be a temperature-range difference from the highest to the lowest of 90 degrees. The focus is on the heat. But I’m up at the finish line for every finisher for about 28 hours, and it can be like 30 degrees out up there. And it could have been 130 the day before.

The temperature range and the elevation gain and elevation range are all factored into the whole thing.

Anything can happen out there. We’ve had flash floods, we’ve had forest fires.  All kinds of things possible. So it's not just pavement and heat. It’s whatever nature has in store."

Kostman is a runner with wide experience. "I've done three 100-milers, through ironically they were all on showshoes in Alaska in the winter," he said.  I’ve also done a lot of lot of ultra-distance cycling in South America and stuff like that."

Who in the world is motivated enough to run the Badwater, I asked. People who enjoy the lifelong challenge of peak performance, he replied. "It's like when you're young and start paying chess and and you win a lot of games, and maybe then it just sort of becomes your thing in life because you got all that positive feedback from winning and you thrive in it, so you keep doing it better. That really describes most of our athletes. They enjoy running, they enjoy the environment, they like traveling -- so they can tie it all together by doing their best like this, where you can cover a lot of ground, see a lot of things in a part of the world you wouldn't otherwise see."

"Badwater is really celebration of life and the human spirit. That kind of gets lost in the shuffle where people think it’s just insane or they focus too much on the competition.  There’s 100 people in the race, and there’s basically four or five men and two or three women who are capable of being first in the male or female divisions. But just getting to the start line is a huge deal, and doing it and finishing is a pinnacle achievement for any ultra-runner. It's really not about the competition or even the winner. Winners don’t receive anything different than anyone else – they all get a belt buckle and a tee-shirt. Those just represent the culmination of years or training and preparation and development, not only as a runner but as a person."

Do they rest or sleep along the grueling 135-mile route?  Kostman: "The front-runners never sleep; they basically don’t even stop. Very few people sleep at all, and even the 48-hour finishers [toward the end of the race] probably don’t sleep more than an hour. But nobody who wants to be in the top 10 can ever stop for more than five minutes, ever. The pace is too high and it's too competitive. Basically they only stop to use the bathroom."

Still, what kind of a human being can do this? The truly motivated simply condition themselves for these astonishing physical extremes, Kostman said. "It's pretty remarkable what people can do. Acclimating to the heat is sort of like mountaineers getting use to the high altitude. In general, you can train your body to do a lot more than you think."

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Funny Foreign Name Pranks: Oh, Just Chill ...

All this pious media handwringing over the "racist" nature of pranking some dumb TV station into reading phony names of the Asiana crash pilots aside ("Wi Tu Lo" and "Ho Lee Fuk" among them), there is an solid body of precedent for this silliness, beyond the aforementioned Bart Simpson calling Moe's Tavern and the Pakistani pranksters who tricked airport information announcers at Heathrow into reading hilariously silly-sounding names.

Like this hysterically funny Saturday Night Live skit with Robert DeNiro as a White House spokesman announcing a litany of names of Middle Eastern terrorists being sought, among them the notorious i-Bin Pharteen and M'Balz es-Hari.

And of course it's not just foreign names lend themselves to this silliness, as was pointed out by readers Ophelia Bush, Seymour Butz and Mike Rotch.

Asiana Airlines, which one would think might have other legal matters to worry about, ridiculously threatens to "sue" the Bay Area TV station that fell for the prank. The airline's legal counsel Wi Soo Yu was not available for comment.

Nor was the always quotable Heywood Jablome, who has been featured at least three times in recent years in the always susceptible New York Post.

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KTVU-TV: Some.Thing.Wrong

There is definitely some.thing.wrong with the lame explanation being trotted out by a Bay Area local television station for the roaring goatfuck of a fiasco yesterday, in which one of their anchors actually read those clearly ridiculous names (above) on the air as being the names of the pilots of the Asiana Airlines 777 that crashed in San Francisco last week. (This just in!)

Yes, she read them on the air, showing not a trace of cognizance that the names are obviously part of a hoax. The video has gone major viral. Here it is.

The television station, KTVU-TV,  a Fox affiliate in Oakland, Calif., has apologized for the idiotic gaff, but in the cheesiest way possible. Yes, the station worthies say, we made a big mistake. But part of the blame, says KTVU,  lies with the National Transportation Safety Board (N.T.S.B.), where "an N.T.S.B. official" actually confirmed the names to KTVU.

And, astonishingly, the N.T.S.B. has put out a statement admitting that "a summer intern" (hardly an "official," but more on that in a minute) did in fact erroneously and without having authority to do so confirm those names to the TV station. Here is that utterly remarkable statement.

Some of the mainstream media are gingerly reporting on this incident, without asking the right questions. Most of the mainstream media are prissily afraid to touch it, because doing so requires repeating the insensitive joke.

Now, of course, there is a tradition of pranks, including phone calls and absolutely hilarious prank airport announcements, that depend on the phonetic comic effects of hearing syllables in seemingly legitimate foreign names of many syllables. Some of these actually were recorded at Heathrow Airport, where pranksters posing as taxi drivers looking for their customers handed written names to an unsuspecting airport public-service announcement workers, who would then get on the loudspeakers and ask for people like the following to please contact airport information: "Arheddis Varkenjaab and Aywellbe Fayed." (Sound it out).

The prank genre also includes western names -- "I.P. Daily" being the earliest example I can think of, and I think I was maybe 11 years old when I first heard it. And Bart Simpson famously makes prank calls to Moe's Tavern, causing Moe to answer the phone and credulously call out to the customers things like "Hey, has anybody seen Mike Rotch?"

And more recently, the newspaper than nobody pays for, USA Today, printed an article in which a version in the the good old "Ophelia Bush" turned up. Not to mention the poor hapless New York Post, which had a run for several years of being pranked by young wiseguys quoted in routine stories who identified themselves as "Heywood Jablome."

So as admittedly insensitive as the Asiana prank was, considering that three people died and many were injured, the issue to me isn't "racism" as much as it is a certain brand of media and bureaucratic piety at work. That is, how did this prank actually occur, and why haven't the TV station and the N.T.S.B. been pressured into giving a cogent, honest explanation?  

Here are the questions they aren't asking and that should be asked:

1. How the holy crap did this prank get on the air on the newscast of a major local television station? And don't give me that, "Well, an N.T.S.B. official confirmed it." In which way, specifically, did that N.T.S.B. summer intern "confirm" the names? In a phone call?  By e-mail?

2. If in a phone call, did that not then require the names to be vocally read out to the "N.T.S.B. official?"

3. Aside from some so-far anonymous summer intern confirming them in some manner that hasn't been explained, how did KTVU come up with those names in the first place? This was a cognitive process. Someone in the KTVU newsroom had to get the names, look at them, and then make whatever minimal effort was required to "confirm" them with the N.T.S.B., by phone call or e-mail. In that contact with the N.T.S.B. intern, the names either had to be pronounced on the phone, or typed into an e-mail that was read by at least two parties. Then those names had to be physically typed onto that slide, or whatever they call it that card they show on the screen. Certainly, in the KTVU newsroom itself, at least one conversation had to occur about this "breaking news" event before it went out live, with the anchor woman credulously reading the joke names. 

4. At the N.T.S.B, the PR chief needs to be required explain how this got screwed up. The N.T.S.B. "apology" is unclear and inadequate. Who specifically did the confirming? How? If in an e-mail, what is the text of that correspondence? If a phone call, what specifically was said by both parties?

5. Are the media going to let this television station get away with claiming that an "N.T.S.B. official" confirmed these ridiculous names, without asking how that exchange actually went?

The Asian American Journalists Association asked a good question. In a statement, the group said, "... the names originated from somewhere — and we fail to understand how those obviously phony names could escape detection before appearing on the broadcast and were spoken by the news anchor."

Local TV news is a sad joke all across the country, but this screw-up at KTVU seriously ups the ante. How in the world did this happen? I'll bet the answer is even funnier than the prank itself.

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Death Valley at 134 Degrees, July 10, 1913: A Meteorological Sleuthing Tale

I took this photo early one morning last month at Furnace Creek, the lodgings at Death Valley National Park, at the bulletin board in the parking lot where tourists (many of them from Europe, especially Germany) flock in the dead of summer to experience extreme heat and have their photos taken at the thermometer.

The hottest day so far this summer in Death Valley occurred about a week after I took that picture: 129 degrees on June 20. (Yesterday, the Death Valley high was 120 degrees.)

But the hottest ever was 134 degrees on July 10, 1913, 100 years ago yesterday. That was the highest temperature ever recorded on earth. And therein lies a tale, because Death Valley was awarded the record for the hottest temperature ever only last year, after languishing in second place for 90 years behind Al Azizia in Libya, where the claim had been that it hit 136.4 degrees Fahrenheit (58C), on Sept. 13, 1922.

Turns out the Libyan record was a clunker. In January 2012, after reviewing evidence disputing the Libyan record that had been collected by curious meteorologists from California to England to Libya, the World Meteorological Organization stripped Libya of the record and returned it to Death Valley, where the data were not in any dispute.

Here's how this particular egg got fried (and by the way, so many tourists are imitating that media hot-weather stunt of trying to fry an egg on a sidewalk that Furnace Creek officials had to issue a plea for them to stop it this week):

The account is from Christopher C. Burt, the weather historian at Weatherunderground.com:

In early 2010, an e mail look was making the rounds among some meteorologists around the world discussing some skepticism that had been raised about the 1922 Libyan records.on which the frecord-temperature claim had been based.

Piotr Djakow, a Polish weather researcher, "had produced a chart of the monthly temperature amplitudes at Azizia for each September from 1921-1940, and this chart raised an alarm" about the Linyan claim, Burt wrote on his blog. Khalid Ibrahim el Fadli, the director of the climate department at the Libyan National Meteorological Center in Tripoli, also weighed in expressing skepticism, says Bart, who then joined the sleuthing, seeking more data and finally posting a blog entry in October, disputing the Libyan record.

The World Meteorological Organization, which certifies global climate and temperature data, then got involved. In Libya, meanwhile, El Fadli uncovered a key colonial-era document, the handwritten log sheet from the Azizia station for September 1922. It showed major discrepancies and sloppy record-keeping, including the transposing of figures.

The Libyan revolution interrupted the investigation, and global meteorologists had to call a hiatus on the investigations when Libyan dictator Gaddafi began claiming that foreign conspirators were "using Libyan climate data to plan their assault on the country," writes Burt, who along with colleagues around the world then "thought El Fadli was a dead man."

But in August 2011, with Gaddafi's regime in rout, El Fadli again turned up in the e-mail loop. "With the investigation back on track, committee members made further progress in October and November," says Burt. Then, he adds, "Dr. David Parker of the U.K. Meteorological Office did a reanalysis of surface conditions across the Libyan region for September 1922." The case was soon closed. At Azizia in September 1922, an inexperienced colonial observer had simply got the numbers wrong in his observations.

Burt says: "With all of the pieces of the puzzle now falling into place, a vote was taken in January 2012 resulting in a unanimous decision by the WMO [World Meteorological Organization] committee members to disallow the Azizia record."

Burt's conclusion is important:

"The WMO committee added the following comment: 'An important aspect of this long investigation was that is isn't just climatologists and meteorologists changing their minds [as a result of evidence]. It goes beyond that. This investigation demonstrates that, because of continued improvements in meteorology and climatology, researchers can now reanalyze past weather records in much more detail and with greater precision than ever before. The end result is an even better set of data for analysis of important global and regional questions involving climate change. Additionally, it shows the effectiveness of truly global cooperation and analysis." And so, the WMO concluded that "the official highest recorded surface temperature of 56.7 degrees C (134F)" occurred on July 10, 1913, at Death Valley.

As they say, you could look it up.

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Mourning in America

It seems every time I pass a flagpole in a public place these days, Old Glory is flying at half-staff for one reason or another.

Looking at our TV and print media constantly dishing up tearful memorials and tributes, someone from far away could be forgiven for assuming that we are a culture that spends an inordinate amount of time in collective mourning.

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N.T.S.B. To Media on San Francisco Crash: Just the Facts, Please

The speculation on the San Francisco crash from instant media experts continues in this infernal 24-hour all-news-till-you-wanna-holler-uncle culture.

All of a sudden, some media dilettantes are tossing around words like "stick shaker activation" and "glide slope" as they pose as expert investigators. Back in 1979, I was one of the reporters out of Philadelphia who covered the Three Mile Island nuclear plant partial meltdown, and I remember being amazed then at how some fellow reporters who couldn't do the math to make change from bus fare had become instant experts in nuclear physics.

Anyway, I think it's useful to have a look at a press conference today in San Francisco run by Deborah Hersman, the head of the National Transportation Safety Board, a federal agency that is universally respected. Here's the link from the N.T.S.B. web site.

"I would ask for to make sure you report the facts," Ms. Hersman said after she had carefully laid out what was factually known about the crash up to that minute, less than a day after N.T.S.B. investigators arrived on the scene. "We will not speculate. We are telling you what we know to be true," she added.

And in her 32-minute briefing, she did in fact discuss a good amount of factual information that is now on the record. Most importantly, data from the flight indicate that the plane was flying well under the designated speed for the landing, and that the pilots had an automated cockpit warning seven seconds before the crash to increase speed, followed by another warning that a stall was imminent, whereupon the pilots decided that they needed to do a "go-around" --- that is, abort the landing, step on the gas, and go around for another approach -- less than two seconds before impact, she said. Which was too late, of course. 

That's factual, based on observable evidence. But let's hope that the warning about speculation gets through to some of the more excitable media bloviators, the ones who are blathering on based on pure speculation, just to fill their infernal air time. Please, just the facts.

Below are some photos the N.T.S.B. released today of the cabin wreckage and the plane wreckage. Some clown on Twitter furiously objected to the N.T.S.B. releasing photos of a "crime scene," and had to be set straight by the N.T.S.B. that this is accident investigation, not a criminal one. Which reminds me of my personal experience in the Brazil mid-air collision in 2006, when the Brazilian authorities and Brazilian media kept insisting that the crash was a criminal matter. And we know how well that folly turned out, as air traffic controllers and others with important knowledge of the foul-up that had put two planes on a collision course over the Amazon went silent and refused to talk. Air traffic in Brazil was tied in knots for months, and not even 10 months after the Amazon mid-air crash, which killed 154, a worse crash occurred at the Sao Paulo airport, which killed 199.

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