Limits On Passengers' Electronics On Certain Incoming Int'l Flights

BALTIMORE (WJZ) -- The sudden banning of laptops and tablets from airplane passenger cabins is growing. At first, only the U.S. was imposing the rule on planes from eight African and Middle Eastern countries. Now, Great Britain is also joining the ban.

Homeland Security is not listing any specific threats, but it may have to do with advances by terrorist bomb-makers.

The ban on laptop computers and tablets in airplane passenger cabins only applies to flights into the United States, from eight African and Middle Eastern countries.

Now that Great Britain is also imposing the rule, "That again lends credence to the idea that this new regulation is in reaction to a particular threat," says Ben Yellin with the University of Maryland Center for Health and Homeland Security.

But if so, Homeland Security is not saying what that specific threat might be, beyond a statement that the rules were prompted by "evaluated intelligence" that terrorists continue to target commercial aviation by "smuggling explosives in portable electronic devices."

Analysts at the University of Maryland's Center for Health and Homeland Security, speculate a breakthrough by the bomb makers:

"The devices were still in their early stages, were not yet functional. The concern, just by issuing this threat, is perhaps the department of homeland security has new information to indicate the devices are now operational," says Yellin.

The ban does not include smartphones but for passengers used to flying with their electronics,

"These flights are long. I mean people want to use that time to be productive," says one traveler.

Still, many insist there is potential there is destructive potential.

A bomb killed 224 passengers aboard a Russian jet in 2015, shortly after take-off from an Egyptian airport.

"We've evolved from 9-11 to the shoe bomber to this incident with the Russian airliner to this new threat, but airplanes have been the common thread we've seen over the last several years," says Yellin.

The two U.S. airports landing the most flights from Africa and the Middle East are New York and Los Angeles.

Today, Turkey filed a formal complaint, asking the electronics ban be lifted from flights leaving its airports.

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