"Security gap at McCarran?"

Monday, June 24, 2002

Column
Security gap at McCarran?
By Ken Kaye
The South Florida Sun-Sentinel


Security gap: Despite the government's ongoing efforts to tighten airport
security, I still receive a lot of calls and e-mails from people relating
breaches.

Bernice Grossman of Tamarac passed along a disturbing one.

She had been in Las Vegas last month to do a little gambling, celebrate her
75th birthday and meet up with her two children.

Before hopping a flight back to Fort Lauderdale, a skycap at the curb gave
her a boarding pass, which she needed to get through two security
checkpoints at the Las Vegas McCarran International Airport.

It wasn't until she was sitting at her gate that she noticed the name on her
boarding pass was that of Jean Cross with a final destination of Myrtle
Beach, S.C.

Grossman has no idea who Jean Cross is.

"I just can't understand how something like this could happen," she said.
"Nobody caught it."

She complained to Delta officials, who took the boarding pass, ripped it up
and explained it wasn't their fault because another company employed the
skycap.

A Delta representative told her to notify the Federal Aviation
Administration, even though the proper agency would have been the
Transportation Security Administration.

She wrote to the FAA and, of course, received no response.

The experience left Grossman feeling uneasy particularly because she had to
take another flight to Boston last week.

"My concern is that you keep hearing about airport security. But as far as I
was concerned there was no security," she said.

"I think they just make a big noise."

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