Ask anyone old enough to remember travel before September 11, 2001, and you’re likely to get a gauzy recollection of what flying was like.
There was security screening, but it wasn’t anywhere near as intrusive. There were no long checkpoint lines. Passengers and their families could walk right to the gate together.
That all ended when four hijacked planes crashed into the World Trade Centre towers, the Pentagon and a field in Pennsylvania.
The worst terror attack on American soil led to increased and sometimes tension-filled security measures in airports across the world.
The cataclysm has also contributed to other changes large and small that have reshaped the airline industry – and, for consumers, made air travel more stressful than ever.
Two months after the attacks, President George W. Bush signed legislation creating the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) , which required that all checked bags be screened, cockpit doors be reinforced, and more federal air marshals be put…
