HOMELAND INSECURITY
Screeners ignore
'alarmed' luggage
Airport-security experts fear less than 5% of checked suitcases properly scrutinized
By Paul Sperry
© 2002 WorldNetDaily.com
WASHINGTON – The government says only about 10 percent of checked suitcases are now scanned for explosives. But the share may actually be far less, warn airport security specialists.
Some operators of the 161 bomb-detecting machines deployed in U.S. airports are clearing bags that set off alarms without opening them to search for explosives, they say.
On Dec. 8, for example, operators of the CTX machine at Washington Ronald Reagan International Airport, located next to the US Airways ticket counter, failed to search "scores" of bags that "alarmed," according to a security consultant and former federal law enforcement officer.
"Turns out the screeners are clearing suspect bags by asking passengers what they have in their suitcases, as if a terrorist would admit he's got a bomb," the security expert said.
"They didn't open a single suitcase out of the scores that alarmed in the half hour I spent watching them," he added.
Federal Aviation Administration agents who have gone undercover to conduct stings on security screeners, as part of the FAA's so-called Red Teams, say CTX operators are known to clear flagged suitcases without opening them.
"In certain past Red Team tests, when the CTX indicated an item in a bag should be checked, the screener ignored that indication," said Steve Elson, a veteran FAA agent, who worked on the original field tests of the CTX machines, which use computerized-tomography technology.
"This was documented and known to FAA management several years ago, but no discernible corrective action was taken," Elson said.
One reason: Slower luggage "through-put rates" can lead to flight delays, he says.
Airlines expect operators to scan up to 500 bags an hour through the machines, if needed, and FAA management seldom challenges the airlines on security procedures, charges Elson, who left the agency in 1999 after he says headquarters ignored his repeated warnings.
"Screening all bags for bombs is a must," asserted a United Airlines pilot who flies out of Washington Dulles International Airport.
"Currently, it is done probably well less than 5 percent of the time," the pilot told WorldNetDaily.
Elson and other FAA agents agree.
But an FAA spokeswoman says the agency addressed special agents' concerns by adding light poles to CTX scanning machines, which are normally surrounded by walls, within the last three years to make sure operators were "resolving" bags that failed the explosives scans.
Light poles
"The light poles were added to assist FAA inspectors and testers in determining whether or not operators are following proper alarm procedures," FAA's Alison Duquette told WorldNetDaily.
"When the CTX alarms on a bag, the light pole lights," she explained. "This alerts the inspector or tester that the operator should be taking additional measures to clear that bag."
Elson calls the lights, which he said cost about $5,000 per unit, "a waste of money," because they may actually discourage testers from looking over the shoulders of operators.
Duquette didn't put a figure on how much it cost to retrofit the machines with the light poles, but she called it "nominal."
The Aviation Security Act, signed into law Nov. 19, mandates that the federal government install explosives-detecting scanners at all U.S. airports by Dec. 31 of this year. The FAA figures the U.S. needs to buy 2,000 more machines, costing as much as $1.5 million each.
2,000 machines needed
But the FAA doubts the government can meet the year-end deadline.
One reason is that only two manufacturers – In Vision Technologies Inc. and L-3 Communications Holdings Inc. – are certified by the government to make the machines. And they can't make them fast enough.
Also, CTX and L-3 machines are essentially jumbo computers, as big as minivans. Airports will have to reinforce floors before installing the roughly 9-ton machines. They'll also have to rebuild luggage-conveyor systems to accommodate them.
Checked suitcases aren't the only things sitting like potential ticking time-bombs in the belly of jets, security experts warn.
Even if all bags were effectively screened for explosives, terrorists could still sneak explosives in cargo or airmail, which will still be only randomly screened for bombs.
