"Airport security misses weapons"

Sunday, June 30, 2002

Airport security misses weapons
By Blake Morrison
USA TODAY


Checkpoint screeners at 32 of the nation's largest airports failed to detect
fake guns, dynamite and bombs in almost a quarter of undercover tests by the
Transportation Security Administration last month, documents obtained by USA
TODAY show.

The tests, the first since the new security agency began overseeing
checkpoint screening in February, were done by agents who were instructed to
do little to try to conceal the items as they passed through screening
checkpoints, memos about the tests show.

At three major airports screeners failed to detect potentially dangerous
items in at least half the tests. At a fourth, Los Angeles International
Airport, the results weren't much better. There, screeners repeatedly failed
to detect steel test pieces that set off metal detectors. Screeners also had
difficulty spotting simulated bombs.

"A 41% failure rate is just pathetic," says Jack Plaxe, an aviation security
consultant. "There has to be problems with the people or their training."

Nationwide, screeners often failed to find simulated weapons on agents after
metal-detector alarms sounded. In 178 tries, screeners failed to find
potentially dangerous items on the agents in a third of the tests.

At some of the 32 airports, agents conducted only a handful of tests. At the
12 airports where at least a dozen tests were conducted, the failure rate
was 29%.

The documents detailing the results, considered "security sensitive
information" by the agency, are part of a series of undercover tests that
are set to conclude today. The screeners who were tested had been trained by
security companies that used to work for the airlines and which the TSA now
oversees. Tens of thousands of them likely will be hired by the government
by November, when screeners will become federal employees. The TSA plans to
deploy about 45,000 screeners by then.

"The TSA is looking for problems in the system daily so we can fix them,"
agency spokeswoman Mari Eder says of the tests. "We have issues to correct."

Slightly more than half of the results of 387 tests involved screeners
operating X-ray machines. The other tests assessed whether screeners
detected objects that set off metal-detector alarms.

The results raise questions about whether screening has improved since the
TSA took responsibility for overseeing airport checkpoints.

In tests completed earlier this year before the federal takeover,
investigators with the Transportation Department's independent watchdog, the
inspector general, found failure rates of nearly 50% at 32 airports they
tested.

But the manner in which those tests were done differed from the TSA's
approach. TSA agents were instructed to pack bags containing the simulated
weapons "consistent with how a typical passenger in air transportation might
pack a bag." In particular, agents were told to avoid trying to "artfully
conceal" the simulated weapons - a different tack from that used by the
inspector general's investigators. They tried to simulate how a terrorist,
not a "typical passenger," might bypass security.

TSA officials say their tests weren't intended to emulate the behavior of
terrorists. Rather, officials hoped to see whether screeners could spot
basic items they had been trained to recognize.

But some security analysts question whether the agency's approach of the
tests accurately assesses checkpoint screening.

"We can't assume that terrorists are like your everyday person," Plaxe says.
"They're going to try to trick us."

How airports fared

Failure rates in undercover security tests:

Best

 Miami 6%
 Newark 9%
 Fort Lauderdale 10%
 Honolulu 10%
 JFK, New York 11%

Worst

 Cincinnati 58%
 Las Vegas 50%
 Jacksonville 50%
 Los Angeles 41%
 Sacramento 40%

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