Let's play a game, like Cops and Robbers but somewhat less complicated. (I never could memorize the Miranda rights declaration when I was a kid, and all my friends got released on technicalities.) We'll call this game Airport Security, where if you screw it up, a few hundred people can die a terrifying death. In this game, you're the security professional, and this is what you see:

[A] man with a Middle Eastern name and a ticket for a Delta Airlines flight to Atlanta shook his head when screeners asked if he had a laptop computer in his baggage, but an X-ray machine operator detected a laptop.

A search of the man's baggage revealed a clock with a 9-volt battery taped to it and a copy of the Quran, the report said. A screener examined the man's shoes and determined that the "entire soles of both shoes were gutted out."

No explosive material was detected ...[You're] unable to check the passenger's criminal background because of computer problems.

Now, what do you do? Keep the man from boarding his flight? Call the FBI to ensure that this man has no history of terrorism or does not appear on any watch lists? Not if you work for the TSA or the Houston police department, according to the Chronicle:

Houston police and the federal Transportation Security Administration disagree over who is responsible for allowing a man with what appeared to be bomb components board an aircraft at Hobby Airport last week. ...

A police officer was summoned and questioned the man, examined his identification, shoes and the clock, then cleared him for travel, according to the report.

A TSA screener disagreed with the officer, saying "the shoes had been tampered with and there were all the components of (a bomb) except the explosive itself," the report says.

The officer retorted, "I thought y'all were trained in this stuff," TSA officials reported.

We thought that both the TSA and the Houston police department had received enough training to stop someone this suspicious from boarding an airplane. The FBI says that they have cleared the traveler and that the incident wound up posing no danger to the flight, but either that turned out to be luck or the traveler was an American plant designed to test the system. Either way, the system failed in Houston.

Whenever anyone answers falsely at a security checkpoint, it should raise a red flag in a security officer's mind. If they see a significant modification of consumer electronics that makes no sense for its operation, that should raise another red flag. In this case, the Arabic surname and the Qu'ran are secondary issues; anyone who presents the first two issues should be held until they can get clearance through the FBI as to whether the passenger poses a threat. Arguing that a slow computer response alleviates them from this responsibility just means that the people involved do not have the appropriate understanding of their mission.

TSA and the Houston PD had better clean up its act. Any hole in any security procedure anywhere in the US puts the rest of us at risk. They should start by hiring adults who understand and take responsibility for their actions and their decisions

Trackback Pings

TrackBack URL for this entry is

Listed below are links to weblogs that reference Can Someone Put Adults In Charge Of Security?:

» Terrorist Dry-Runs? from The View From The Nest
They had all they needed to hold him--HE LIED! [Read More]

Tracked on July 10, 2006 9:23 PM