World Tourism Blog

Sure, you want to tone up and slim down, but who wants to use those precious vacation days working out?

Luckily, you can combine your desire to get into shape with your love of travel for a fantastic fitness vacation, with these trip ideas where getting svelte and seeing the sights go hand-in-hand.

Whatever your idea of a great escape — deserted Caribbean beaches, viewing wildlife in Africa, or even a cruise — chances are we’ve covered it on our list.

Let your next trip be to one of these places to get into shape, and you’ll come home with the best souvenir of all: a hot new bod.

Alsace, France

Looking for your inner Lance but not quite ready for the Tour de France? No sweat (just yet): Pack up your bicyclette (or rent one there) and head to France’s Alsace region, near the Swiss and German borders, for a fitness vacation to remember.

With designated bike routes throughout the area, it’s a pure delight to pedal beside the beautiful Vosges Mountains, through charming villages, and past the fantastic vineyards that lie along the 106-mile long Route des Vins (Wine Route) where crisp Rieslings and Gewurztraminers are born — after all, you can’t go all the way to France and not indulge at least a little.

At sea

Though most people plan to pack on a few pounds on their cruise vacation — after all, it’s easy to overindulge at those all-you-can-eat-buffets! — Crystal Cruises aims to buck the trend with its wellness-themed cruises.

In addition to the usual onboard diversions, the line’s 2010 Mind, Body, and Spirit sailings to the Mexican Riviera (as well as Asian itineraries and transatlantic crossings) encourage you to get buff onboard, whether in the state-of-the-art gym, a yoga or Pilates class, or on the quarter-mile track along the open-air Promenade Deck, where you can enjoy stunning ocean views while running your laps.

With a full menu of healthy meals to keep you refueled, you’ll have no problem saying “no thank you” to seconds at the buffet.

Dominica

When you tire of the mega-resorts, all-you-can-eat buffets, and sugary drinks that dominate so many Caribbean islands, head to Dominica, where healthy pursuits constitute the majority of things to do.

Indeed, the main attractions on this unspoiled, lush island involve rainforest hikes, swimming in natural thermal pools, and overall personal wellness.

To jump-start your new healthy lifestyle, book the Jungle Spa Adventure Package at the Jungle Bay Resort & Spa and get your room, organic gourmet meals (breakfast, lunch, and dinner), a daily half-hour spa treatment, morning yoga class, and several active excursions like hiking, snorkeling, and kayaking included.

Hawaii

Paddling against the surf is one way to tone and tighten, and if you can actually learn to stand up on the surfboard — well that’s a huge bonus.

Hawaii is synonymous with surfing, and now you can learn this exhilarating sport and get in shape on your next vacation.

SwellWomen, a surf and yoga outfitter on Maui’s Kaanapali Beach, provides healthy, action-packed vacations geared toward women (though they do host co-ed retreats, too), complete with surf lessons, yoga classes, nutritious meals, and accommodations.

Only want surfing lessons? We recommend Surf Hawaii Surf School on Oahu’s North Shore, home to the epic waves of Waimea Bay and the Banzai Pipeline.

Hua Hin, Thailand

There’s a lot more to feeling good than just looking good, and Thailand’s Chiva Som fitness vacation retreat in Hua Hin treats your whole person: mind, body, and spirit.

Options range from a weeklong weight management program to an intense four-week detoxification complete with a juice fast and colonics, but all programs feature one-on-one fitness and nutritional counseling, a diet of Asian spa cuisine, and daily activities like Thai boxing, weight training, aqua aerobics, biking, and yoga.

This East-meets-West approach to wellness also boasts a beautiful beach setting on the Gulf of Thailand and a location near several cultural attractions (temples, caves, and a royal palace), so guests can get out and explore as well. Home Security Systems.

A jittery blend of airborne vigilantism, the eight-year wear of security-line stare downs and the Christmas confirmation that our protectors are not fully protecting us seems to have stoked a fresh outbreak of the mile-high heebie-jeebies.

Never “an alarmist” and “always practical” about flying in an age of terrorism, Betsy Hurner nestled nervously into seat 9F last Thursday night as her Northwest Airlines jet prepared to depart Detroit Metropolitan Airport.

Minutes earlier, Hurner had gazed at a gate TV as President Obama listed the “systemic failures” that allowed a known anti-American threat to board a Christmas flight bound for that same airport. In her hands, she clutched a Time magazine detailing how the Nigerian man allegedly tried to ignite an underwear bomb, only to be thwarted by a fellow passenger.

“I found myself looking around at the other passengers, evaluating not only if people were security threats, but also if my fellow passengers were on guard,” said Hurner, a corporate marketing manager from Memphis. “What if the person sitting next to the Christmas Day terrorist had been too busy on his laptop to notice? … Knowing you have a certain amount of control over your own safety almost adds to the stress of a flight.

“I feel a certain amount of responsibility to keep my eyes and ears open. There’s no more sitting back and enjoying the ride.”

A jittery blend of airborne vigilantism, the eight-year wear of security-line stare downs and the Christmas confirmation that our protectors are not fully protecting us seems to have stoked a fresh outbreak of the mile-high heebie-jeebies.

For some travelers, it’s not “fight or flight.” It is flight and fight. Consider:

* On Wednesday, a Dutch passenger made false bomb threats during an Amsterdam-to-Aruba flight. The ArkeFly jet, carrying 235 people, diverted to Ireland.
* The day after Hurner’s Jan. 7 trip, a San Francisco-bound AirTran Airways plane was diverted to Colorado with a military F-16 escort after a combative passenger locked himself in the jet’s bathroom.
* That same Friday, a Hawaiian Airlines flight headed to the Aloha State returned to Las Vegas after a man allegedly harassed another passenger.
* On Jan. 7, a passenger on a Detroit-bound jet was arrested for disorderly conduct, among other charges, after yelling “I want to kill all the jews.”
* On Jan. 5, NORAD scrambled two F-15s to escort a Hawaii-bound jet back to Portland, Ore. after a passenger onboard became disruptive. Home Security Systems.

Cold weather and blowing snow slowed freight train traffic across the Plains on Friday and forced Amtrak to suspend service between Chicago and Denver.

The one train that runs between Chicago and Denver won’t operate on Friday. Passengers on the train that runs from the San Francisco area through Salt Lake City and Denver will be put on buses once they reach Denver.

Depending on their destination, passengers will either head east by bus to Nebraska or south to La Junta where they can catch another train to points in Iowa and Illinois, Amtrak spokesman Marc Magliari said.

Burlington Northern Santa Fe said the cold weather and snow was causing its freight trains to be delayed between 24 and 72 hours in Colorado, Illinois, Kansas, Missouri, Minnesota, Montana and North and South Dakota.

Mark Davis, a spokesman for Omaha, Neb.-based Union Pacific, said the bad weather has also forced Union Pacific to warn its customers to expect similar delays on shipments.

Trains simply can’t move as fast through the nation’s northern tier of states because of the cold, snow and ice.

The braking systems don’t work as well, Davis said, so trains must be shorter. The diesel locomotives are more prone to mechanical problems in the cold, so repairs can cause delays.

Snow and ice can clog switches, which must be cleared and tested before trains can continue on their routes through them.

BNSF spokesman Steve Forsberg said trains have been able to plow through drifts of snow up to 6 feet in Nebraska, but crews have to stop to clear off snow from windshields.

Four to 5 inches of snow preceded the bone-chilling cold that has gripped Nebraska and other Plains and Midwest states. Hard money training.

A cold snap in northern China has thrown daily life into confusion, but is ideal for fairy tale palaces, towering pagodas, and even a sphinx — all carved from ice — that make up the sights at this year’s Harbin International Ice and Snow Sculpture Festival.

The annual event in northern China, now in its 26th year, pulls crowds from across China and even a few visitors from overseas, drawn to the unique visions of an international roster of sculptors who illuminate their creations with multicolored electric lights encased in the translucent ice.

Tuesday night’s opening ceremony featured a fireworks display, lighting up the sky above the festival’s main site on Sun Island alongside the frozen Songhua River running to the north of Harbin, a metropolis as far north as Toronto that styles itself China’s “ice city.”

Past festival themes have included the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games, while perennial motifs include famous Chinese tourist sites such as Beijing’s Forbidden City and the Great Wall of China. Tired of looking at the sculptures? Take a ride on the ice slide, but be sure to get out of the way quick as other thrill seekers zip down on you from behind.

Other hazards include elbow-to-elbow crowds at popular times of the night and intense cold temperatures that dipped to 3 degrees Fahrenheit (-16 Celsius) on Tuesday amid light snow.

A recent cold spell has benefited the festival, but has caused havoc in other parts of northern China. Heavy snowstorms caused the cancellation of 756 flights at Beijing’s Capital International Airport and closed highways and rail lines.

Millions of commuters also struggled to get to work for several days, although most transportation lines were back to normal in major cities on Wednesday. Primary and middle schools were also reopened in Beijing and the nearby port of Tianjin.

Away from the festival, Harbin also features varied architecture pointing to its close Russian historical links, dumplings and other tasty northern Chinese eats, and the prospect of skiing at Yuquan, about 65 kilometers from the city, and China’s premier Yabuli resort, 200 kilometers (120 miles) to the east. Hard money training.

Snow storms. Security breaches. An idiot with explosives in his underwear and a security response of comparable intelligence.

If past is prologue and the last few weeks are any indication, 2010 is shaping up to be an extremely turbulent year for travelers.

On Sunday, Terminal C at Newark Airport was shut down after a man was seen walking the wrong way through an exit toward the terminal’s secure area. Flights were grounded, seated passengers were hustled back to the terminal and thousands had to be rescreened.

The same day, TSA announced new directives that require passengers traveling to the U.S. from or through 14 countries deemed “state sponsors of terrorism” or “other countries of interest” to go through enhanced screening.

And on Monday, travelers woke up to what could be a new — and increasingly unpleasant — era in air travel.

Ever since Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab tried to blow up a Detroit-bound plane on Christmas Day, it’s become increasingly clear that there’s more to making air travel safe than foiling a single attack. As the Nigerian jihadi has told the FBI, there are others just like him waiting to strike.

The problem, of course, is that with security personnel on alert for explosive powders, Abdulmutallab’s associates have no doubt already shifted their tactics. The next attack is as unlikely to involve underwear as it is shoes or liquid explosives disguised as energy drinks.

“The problem security personnel face is that they’re always chasing something that’s already happened,” says Douglas Laird, an industry consultant and former security director for Northwest Airlines. “They’re not prepared for something that happens in the future.”

Witness the immediate response to the Christmas Day incident, which was characterized by a randomly applied, crazy quilt of restrictions based on Abdulmutallab’s actions. No getting up from one’s seat within an hour of landing. No blankets, pillows or personal belongings on laps. No in-flight entertainment on international flights.

The Christmas Day plot has also renewed the call for more full-body scanning at screening stations, a technology that backers say would likely have revealed the explosives Abdulmutallab carried. With 40 such machines currently in use in 19 U.S. airports, TSA has purchased another 150 and recently announced plans to purchase 300 more over the next few years.

But such machines — which produce near-naked images of passengers — are no panacea. Privacy issues aside, the machines suffer the same shortcomings as their predecessors: Spending millions of dollars to target what terrorists have tried in the past will only hasten their efforts to try something else. It’s a sad fact, but even the newest screening machine won’t catch a committed terrorist with a suppository.

“Instead of looking for bad things — nail clippers and rogue bottles of shampoo — security systems need to focus on bad people,” says Giovanni Bisignani, director of the International Air Transport Association. “Adding new hardware to an old system will not deliver the results we need.” Hard money training.

As Ronak Ray hunted for his flight gate, he prepared for the prospect of a security guard peering through his clothes with a full body scanner. But Ray doesn’t mind: what he gives up in privacy he gets back in security.

“I think it’s necessary,” said Ray, a 23-year-old graduate student who was at San Francisco International Airport to fly to India. “Our lives are far more important than how we’re being searched.”

Despite controversy surrounding the scans, Ray’s position was typical of several travelers interviewed at various airports Wednesday by The Associated Press.

Airports in five other U.S. cities are also using full body scanners at specific checkpoints instead of metal detectors. In addition, the scanners are used at 13 other airports for random checks and so-called secondary screenings of passengers who set off detectors.

But many more air travelers may have to get used to the idea soon. The Transportation Security Administration has ordered 150 more full body scanners to be installed in airports throughout the country in early 2010, agency spokeswoman Suzanne Trevino said.

Dutch security officials have said they believe such scanners could have detected the explosive materials Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab of Nigeria is accused of trying to ignite aboard a Detroit-bound Northwest Airlines flight Christmas Day.

Amsterdam’s Schiphol Airport has 15 full body scanners, but none were used to scan Abdulmutallab when he boarded. In Europe and the U.S., privacy concerns over the scanners’ ability to see through clothing have kept them from widespread use.

The technology was first used about two years ago to make it easier for airport security to do body searches without making physical contact with passengers.

The idea of an electronic strip search did not bother Judy Yeager, 62, of Sarasota, Fla., as she prepared to depart Las Vegas. She stood in the full-body scanner Wednesday afternoon and held her arms up as a security official guided her through the gray closet-sized booth.

“If it’s going to protect a whole airplane of people, who gives a flying you-know-what if they see my boob whatever,” Yeager said. “That’s the way I feel, honest to God.”

George Hyde, of Birmingham, Ala., who was flying out of Salt Lake City with his wife, Patsy, on Wednesday after visiting their children and grandchildren in Park City, Utah.

“I’d rather be safe than be embarrassed,” Hyde said. Neither he nor his wife had been through a body scanner before.

“We’re very modest people but we’d be willing to go through that for security.”

Trevino said the TSA has worked with privacy advocates and the scanners’ manufacturers to develop software that blurs the faces and genital areas of passengers being scanned. In all cases, passengers are not required to be scanned by the machine but can opt for a full body pat-down instead. Hard money training.

Canadian officials have banned most carry-on luggage for U.S.-bound passengers following a failed Christmas Day plot to blow up a plane flying from Amsterdam to Detroit.

Transport Canada said Monday that passengers may only carry medical devices, small purses, cameras, laptop computers, canes, walkers, diaper bags, musical instruments and bags containing “life-sustaining items.”

Travelers headed for the United States have been allowed to carry on only one bag since Saturday, following 23-year-old Nigerian Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab’s alleged attempted to bring down a Northwest Airlines flight as it prepared to land in Detroit on Friday.

Transport Canada said it is trying to alleviate backlogs at security checkpoints, after passengers complained of chaos and long lines at Pearson International Airport in Toronto over the weekend and Monday morning.

Police are now helping with security at four of Canada’s biggest airports after Transport Canada requested assistance. Police are performing a secondary search of passengers after they pass the main security check point at airports in Toronto, Montreal, Calgary and Edmonton, Alberta. About 40 Royal Canadian Mounted Police officers are doing searches at Pearson.

Transport Canada spokesman Patrick Charette said the measures are expected to remain in place for at least several days.

“We hope the restrictions on those carry-on baggage will help to assure the effectiveness and efficiency of security screening,” Charette said.

At the Toronto airport Monday morning, every U.S.-bound passenger was subjected to a pat-down and luggage was inspected by hand. Getting through the checks took about three hours, with some information boards citing the security measures for several delays and cancelations.

Trish Krale of the Greater Toronto Airports Authority said Monday went somewhat more smoothly at Pearson after a very difficult weekend. More than 130 flights were canceled.

Air Canada and its affiliate Jazz canceled several short-haul flights to the U.S. due to security delays. Air Canada consolidated flights and operated larger aircraft on some routes — particularly from Toronto to destinations in the Northeastern U.S.

“We appreciate the cooperation and understanding of our customers during this challenging time and ask them to assist us in getting them to their destination faster by bringing as little carry-on as possible,” Duncan Dee, Air Canada’s Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer, said in a statement. “Air Canada is doing everything it can to maintain its schedule, despite the delays caused by security screening issues outside its control. However, our number one priority remains the safety and security of our customers and staff.”

One woman said the lines are the worst she’s seen during her family’s annual Christmas trek to Canada.

“This is probably five times the lines we’ve ever experienced,” said Christin Grand, who was traveling home to Atlanta with her three children and husband. “We come up every Christmas and never experienced lines like this. We usually show up an hour and fifteen minutes before our flight and we’re two plus hours before and it’s still crazy.”

Andre Belanger, a Montreal resident flying to Fort Lauderdale from Montreal’s Pierre Elliott Trudeau International Airport, didn’t mind that he was sent back to check in a carry-on bag. Hard money training.

Long before settling amid the soaring peaks of southwestern Colorado, where she helped create a ski experience unlike any other in North America, Jen Brill learned to carve turns on blue ice at some of the better known ski resorts in the East.

“I remember seeing sheets of ice for hundreds of feet and just trying to hold on,” Brill recalled.

No longer does Brill concern herself with what Eastern skiers sometimes refer to with a bit of humor and hyperbole as “bullet proof” ice.

At Silverton — the ski area Brill opened with her husband, Aaron, 10 years ago — the only ice she sees is a snow-dusted frozen cascade she sometimes cruises past on her snowboard while in powder up to her waist.

Silverton is buried under about 400 inches of natural snowfall each year, so the only question about conditions there each day concerns the depth of snow on hill — belt-high or only knee-deep?

The differences between skiing in the East and West are significant and many: altitude, acreage, snow and weather are all different, starkly so at times.

Eastern skiers all have stories of fighting through miserable, face-stinging icy winds and generally wetter conditions that are more common at Appalachian elevations (usually between 1,000-4,000 feet) than in the higher, drier climes of the Rockies, where lifts carry skiers well beyond 10,000 feet above sea level.

But some of the best competitive skiers the United States has ever produced — World Cup champion and Olympic medalist Bode Miller, for example — grew up carving turns in the Northeast, where skiers learn by necessity at an early age the kind of knee angle and weight transfer required for setting an edge in hardpack or ice.

Brill grew up in New York and her parents normally drove north for ski vacations in New England at places like Killington, Vt. If the wind-chill factor dropped close to zero, or if skiers were getting pelted with sleet or freezing rain, she bundled up and got out there anyway.

“We drove four hours … so my parents were like, ‘You’re going skiing no matter what,’ and it made me tougher,” Brill recalled.

There are big-mountain experiences to be had in the East at places like Sugarloaf USA in Maine (2,820 vertical feet), where Miller and snowboard cross Olympic gold medalist Seth Wescott trained.

Most of the trails in the East are carved out below the tree line and are well defined. Because Eastern ski areas rely heavily on snowmaking, venturing into the trees, even for the best skiers, can be difficult and dangerous much of the year, though certainly possible after a blizzard or later in the season during a good snow year.

Snowmaking has made the conditions at larger Eastern resorts like Sunday River in Maine, or Stowe or Sugarbush in Vermont, very dependable. At Sunday River, more than 90 percent of the resort is open for skiing for about four solid months. Although there is snowmaking in the West as well, if it’s a bad snow year, skiers may not be able to get to some of the best terrain in open bowls or in the trees, the things that make skiing in the West special.

Darcy Liberty, who grew up in Maine and now handles public relations for Sunday River, spent several years living in Colorado, working part of that time at Winter Park.

She describes Eastern and Western ski areas as “two different products.”

“I don’t consider there to be direct competition between ski areas in the East and out West,” she said. “Every ski area in the world is competing for skiers and snowboarders interested in the sport, but when it comes to daily operations, you’re mostly looking for skiers in a specific radius.”

With its 1,900 snow guns, Sunday River was able to open as early as October this season.

As snowmaking capacity and grooming techniques have improved over the years, as lifts have become more modern, and as mountains have expanded their trail selections, skiing in the East has become progressively better, from places like Snowshoe, W.Va., to Mont Sainte Anne in Quebec, Canada.

Snowmaking also allows Eastern mountains to offer freestyle skiers and snowboarders half pipes and terrain parks as good as anywhere.

And certainly, the East has its share of glorious ski days — even a power day here and there. Spring skiing, when the snow really softens up, can be exceptional in the East and last into May in Maine.

Both sides of the continent have breathtaking scenery, but with differing contours — softer and more tree-lined in the East, while western ranges like the San Juans or Tetons inspire awe with their sharply rising rock-faced, above-tree line peaks.

Neither side of the country has a monopoly on charming mountain towns, though again, there are differences.

Just outside Sunday River sits Bethel, a more than 200-year-old community which “optimizes the cute New England town,” Liberty says. In the White Mountains of New Hampshire, Jackson and North Conway are both renowned for their rustic appeal, stunning views of the famous Presidential Range and proximity to ski areas like Wildcat and Black Mountain. Hard money training.

Investigators piecing together a brazen attempt to bring down a trans-Atlantic airliner said Sunday the suspect tucked a small bag holding his deadly concoction on his body, using an explosive that would have been easily detected with the right airport equipment.

His success in smuggling and partially igniting the material on Friday’s flight to Detroit prompted the Obama administration to promise a sweeping review of aviation security.

Adding to the airborne jitters, a second Nigerian man was detained Sunday from the same Northwest flight to Detroit after he locked himself in the plane’s bathroom. Officials reported that he was belligerent but genuinely sick, and that, in an abundance of caution, the plane was taken to a remote location for screening before passengers were let off.

Investigators concluded he posed no threat. Despite the government’s decision after the attempted Friday attack to mobilize more air marshals, none was on the Sunday flight from Amsterdam, according to a government report obtained by The Associated Press.

Stiffer boarding measures met passengers at gates as authorities warned travelers to expect extra delays returning home from holidays. White House spokesman Robert Gibbs announced a review of air safety on two broad fronts, saying the government will investigate its systems for placing suspicious travelers on watch lists and for detecting explosives before passengers board flights.

Both lines of defense were breached in an improbable series of events Christmas Day that spanned three continents and culminated in a struggle and fire aboard a Northwest jet shortly before its safe landing in Detroit. Law enforcement officials believed the suspect tried to ignite a two-part concoction of PETN and possibly a glycol-based liquid explosive, setting off popping, smoke and some fire but no deadly detonation.

Nigerian Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, 23, an Islamic devotee once dubbed “the Pope” as a sign of respect by classmates, was released from a Michigan hospital in the custody of federal marshals Sunday after being treated for burns. He is charged with attempting to destroy an aircraft and placing a destructive device in a plane.

Abdulmutallab’s lawyer said Sunday that he is now in a federal prison in Milan, Mich.

Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano hastened to assure people that flying is “very, very safe.”

She said the suspect in Friday’s attack “was stopped before any damage could be done. I think the important thing to recognize here is that once this incident occurred, everything happened that should have.”

That brought a sharp rebuke from Rep. Peter King of New York, the top Republican on the Homeland Security Committee. “It’s not reassuring when the secretary of Homeland Security says the system worked,” King said. “It failed in every respect.”

Sen. Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the Republican leader in the Senate, said, “It’s amazing to me that an individual like this who was sending out so many signals could end up getting on a plane going to the U.S.”

An apparent malfunction in a device designed to detonate the high explosive PETN may have been all that saved the 278 passengers and the crew aboard Northwest Flight 253. No undercover air marshal was on board and passengers and crew subdued the suspect when he tried to set off the explosion. He succeeded only in starting a fire on himself.

Law enforcement officials say Abdulmutallab hid a condom or condom-like pouch below his torso containing PETN, the primary ingredient in detonating cords used for industrial explosions.

Airport “puffer” machines that blow air on a passenger to collect and analyze residues would probably have detected the powder, as would bomb-sniffing dogs or a hands-on search using a swab, they said, but most passengers in airports only go through magnetometers, which detect metal rather than explosives. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the investigation.

Abdulmutallab told authorities after his arrest that his plan originated with al-Qaida’s network inside Yemen, a link the U.S. government has avoided making so far. Napolitano said there was no indication yet that Abdulmutallab is part of a larger terrorist plot, although his possible ties to al-Qaida are still under investigation.

A video posted online four days before the bombing attempt featured an al-Qaida operative in Yemen threatening the U.S. and saying “we are carrying a bomb.” It was not immediately clear whether the speaker was anticipating Friday’s bombing attempt.

Abdulmutallab had been placed on a watch list with more than 500,000 names in November, but not one that denied him passage by air into the U.S. Officials said he came to the attention of U.S. intelligence last month when his father, a prominent Nigerian banker, reported to the American Embassy in Nigeria about his son’s increasingly extremist views.

Despite that red flag, Abdulmutallab was not elevated to more exclusive — and perhaps manageable — lists of some 18,000 people who are designated for additional security searches or barred from flying altogether. Napolitano said that would have required “specific, credible, derogatory information” that authorities didn’t have.

A U.S. official said the father’s concerns were shared among those in the embassy, including liaison personnel from other agencies based there, such as the FBI. The alert was then relayed to Washington and again shared among agencies such as the State, Justice and Homeland Security departments, said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to discuss the investigation.

Nigerian Information Minister Dora Akunyili said Abdulmutallab, who was living in London, sneaked back into Nigeria to catch the flight that would take him to Amsterdam and Detroit. She did not elaborate on how he entered the country.

Abdulmutallab had a U.S. visa issued in June 2008 and valid through June 2010.

Just as passenger shoe searches became the order of the day after Richard Reid tried to blow up a trans-Atlantic flight in 2001 with PETN hidden in his shoes, the latest attempted assault could bring new layers of screening and delays. Among the possibilities: fuller and more frequent body pat-downs and scanning.

“I think we have to head in that direction,” King said. “Yes, there is some brief violation of privacy with a full body scan. But on the other hand, if we can save thousands of lives, to me, we have to make that decision.”

Gibbs was noncommittal on that question. “We obviously want to review and make sure that all the detection capabilities that are supposed to happen, whether it’s a pat-down, whether it’s additional security selection — that that happens in each instance.”

Gibbs appeared on ABC’s “This Week,” NBC’s “Meet the Press” and CBS’ “Face the Nation.” Napolitano spoke on CNN’s “State of the Union” as well as on NBC and ABC. King appeared on CBS; McConnell appeared on ABC. Hard money training.

A major winter storm lumbering across America’s midsection promised a white Christmas for some but brought headaches for travelers caught on slick, icy roads or dealing with canceled and delayed flights.

The worst of the storm was heading northeast across the region Thursday, carrying heavy snow, sleet and rain to a large swath of the Plains and the Midwest.

Up to two feet (two-thirds of a meter) of snow was possible in some areas by Christmas Day.

The National Weather Service issued blizzard warnings early Thursday for Kansas and parts of North Dakota, South Dakota, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Nebraska and the Texas Panhandle.

It cautioned that travel would be extremely dangerous in those areas through the weekend and that anyone taking to the road should pack a winter survival kit including flashlight and water in case of emergency.

Scott Blair, a National Weather Service meteorologist in Topeka, Kansas, said the wind was becoming a serious issue in central Kansas, with gusts reaching 40 mph (64 kph).

“We’re going to see blowing snow,” Blair said. “The big concern comes later when we see snowfall with the wind, causing reduced visibility.”

Slippery roads were blamed for at least 14 deaths. Icy roads were blamed for accidents that killed at least seven people in Nebraska, four in Kansas, one each in Minnesota and Oklahoma, and one near Albuquerque, N.M.

More than 100 scheduled flights from Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport were canceled Thursday and dozens more were delayed, according to the airport’s Web site. The Will Rogers World Airport in Oklahoma City shut down one of its three runways and canceled nearly 30 flights.

The Chicago Department of Aviation said there were no major delays early Thursday at O’Hare International Airport or Midway International Airport. On Wednesday, it reported more than 200 cancellations at O’Hare and about 60 at Midway.

Strong winds and ice caused power outages in Nebraska, Illinois and Iowa.
Hard money training.