"Newark Airport terminal shut after baby goes through checkpoint unscreened"

Saturday, April 28, 2012

Missed baby search leads to chaos, delays at Newark airport
By Mark Mueller
The Newark (NJ) Star-Ledger 


NEWARK - The failure to properly screen a baby for weapons or explosives led
to flight delays and hours of inconvenience for passengers at Newark Liberty
International Airport today.

The security breach, which sparked the evacuation of a section of Terminal
C, also exposed tensions between the Transportation Security Administration
and the Port Authority Police Department, which makes final determinations
about shutdowns and passenger re-screening.

A TSA official said police were told the security slipup carried a "low risk
factor" given the circumstances of the incident, in which the child was
handed from one parent to another during a metal detector walkthrough. Both
parents were properly screened before leaving for their gate.

A short time later, TSA personnel realized the baby had not been checked and
began searching for the family.

"Port Authority police unilaterally made the decision to evacuate the
terminal, sweep the terminal for explosives and re-screen all of the
passengers, inconveniencing hundreds of passengers and delaying numerous
flights," said the official, who was not authorized to discuss the issue by
name because of its delicacy.

The official said police have made similar decisions - against the
recommendations of the TSA - on low-risk breaches in the past.

"This has happened several times," the official said, expressing frustration
with the moves.

Steve Coleman, a spokesman for the Port Authority of New York and New
Jersey, said it took the TSA more than 30 minutes to notify police of the
lapse and that officers "took immediate action to make sure the breach did
not endanger passengers or our facility."

"We're not going to second-guess a real-time decision made by our police
department to err on the side of caution and protect passenger safety,"
Coleman said.

The breach occurred shortly after 1 p.m. at one of three security
checkpoints in the busy terminal. Because each checkpoint leads to specific
gates, the remainder of the terminal was not affected.

TSA spokeswoman Lisa Farbstein said the child's mother, carrying the baby in
her arms, went through a metal detector, which sounded an alarm. The mother
handed the baby to the father, who had already been screened, then walked
through again. Once the woman was cleared, Farbstein said, the family headed
to their gate.

The search for the group was called off when Port Authority police ordered
the evacuation of that section of the terminal and the re-screening of all
passengers. The area was reopened at 2:50 p.m.

While some passengers complained about the delays, traveler Dennis Healy,
47, of Marlboro, said he had no problem with the precautions.

"As bad guys get smarter, they're going to try everything," said Healy, a
food scientist headed to San Diego for a trade conference. "I was in
Manhattan on 9/11. I'd rather wait than not wait."

Related:

Truth as a Tactic
http://www.californiaaviation.org/weblog/2007/08/honesty-as-tactic


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