After reading this morning about the Nigerian who tried to set off an explosive device on an airplane, I wonder why we have a security force. The report said his father had alerted them to his ties to terrorist groups. He had a visa that was valid thru June of 2010. Maybe it's just me, but I would think that the powers to be would have had a red flag about a yard wide come up when he got on a flight to the US. Maybe a good policy would be to send out alerts to airports and CANCEL the visas to suspected terrorists. Let them complain,bitch and moan about how unfair it is to profile them. I don't care, most are not US citizens. Why do we try so hard to assist them in blowing up stuff and killing Americans? This seems to be a trait that follows no party lines . Terrorists do not care if they die. You can not fight against them like they are soldiers in some opposing army.
I wonder how many people with known ties to terrorist groups still have American visas? The number is probably staggering. Time for a change if we are serious about our planes being secure.
I also know I am probably very unrealistic in think the screening at the airport is more than window dressing.

This is why TSA is money down a rat hole. Americans with a brain have known since 9/11/01 that the airline hijacking paradym has forever changed. Passengers are the first and last line of defense against hijackings and are the people more likely to do all that is possible to stop a hijacker from crashing their airplane. TSA and everything else is just fluff for those who think feel good exercises are substantive.

Sg

No,That was his father.

I'm sure we can rehabilitate this poor lad. He just nees time to realize the errors of his ways.

Remember when a bomber was a beezer?

Scary stuff there Hank

Let's be sure to keep this video going, I'm sure more terrorists need this information. Nothing like a how to video to help them out.

RV

Hank

You know as well as I do that until we start profiling, terrorists will have the upper hand. Today we continue harassing little old lady's and allow known Muslim extremist to buy one way tickets with cash and don't check any bags to board airplanes.

This is why TSA is money down a rat hole.

Your local cops do not know about this, DHS is just now realizing the
extent of the danger, and the TSA is OBVIOUSLY not on the ball (imagine
that). The government CANNOT keep you safe.

For the untrained civilian....

The TSA had nothing to do with allowing this person to fly. He boarded overseas and was inbound to the USA. Not under TSA jurisdiction or control.

This type of explosive PETN, has been known about for 5+ years. TSA officers are trained to detect this substance using what limited equipment is being provided to them.
I am a former TSA officer, my wife and brother are current officers. They undergo briefings and training constantly on this stuff. That is why you take off your shoes, are limited in the amount of liquids you carry, etc.

The TSA is doing a better job than the airline run security system ever did. The public does not hear about incidents occurring daily across our country.My wife has detected 2 unknown devices in Portland, that were detonated by the bomb squad. She has recieved several awards for these kind of things. My brother has found 5 handguns in carry-on luggage, I found at least that many. The airlines tried to override TSA detaining these individuals,stating that some were frequent flyers or traveling in fisrt class so therefore were exempt, but were overode themselves by law-enforcement.
TSA is under staffed and under funded. It was supposed to expire after 5 yrs and go back to airline control. Congress didn't go along with that idea, but they are still playing politics and not funding the system to provide the equipment and personell needed to do it right.

The airlines claim they pay for the TSA, no ,YOU do.
The added security fee the airline collects from you, goes to the gov't. The airlines claim it as an expense, they are just the tax collector getting an accounting benefit.

Scary fact:: After 9-11, the middle eastern company that owns many service companies operating in our nations airports, wanted to take over airport security, bringing their own people here and arming all officers with military style weapons, above the authority of the USA law enforcement. Congress almost said yes, but delayed opening the airports until a better plan, TSA, could be established.

TSA is the new and improved version of the private security that the airlines was offering. It incorporated all the changes and ideas that were being tested prior to 9-11, but were not implimented because the airline didn't want to inconvenience their passengers.

Case in point-- the 9-11 hijackers set off the metal detector but were not searched because the airline rep believed the terrorist had a medical implant, actually he had an isreali fighting knife taped to his back, several of them did. The majority had these knives and the composite style knife that are not detectable.Only a few had "box cutters".
TSA officers, some undercover, are trained to watch for these type of people, how they walk, hold themselves, what they are wearing. I spent 3 months undercover and detained, with LAW enforcement, people who turned out to have drugs on them, 1 guy had ammunition in his sock, his wife had a handgun that used the ammo in her diaper bag.

The steps taken now can be vastly improved to be more secure and efficient. It is not being done purely due to politics. Yes some of the TSA people are future Wal-mart greeters building up a gov't pension. They are slowly weeding these people out. Gov't red tape takes time to chew through.

When you travel, be aware of your fellow passengers, feel free to talk with the TSA officers, many of them are pretty cool and knowledgable, most feel the same as you, but their hands are tied.

Current news:::::
Better airport scanners delayed by privacy fears


WASHINGTON — High-tech security scanners that might have prevented the Christmas Day attempt to blow up a jetliner have been installed in only a small number of airports around the world, in large part because of privacy concerns over the way the machines see through clothing.

The body-scanning technology is in at least 19 U.S. airports, while European officials have generally limited it to test runs.

Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the Nigerian accused of trying to ignite explosives aboard a Northwest Airlines jet as it was coming in for a landing in Detroit, did not go through such a scan where his flight began, at Amsterdam's Schiphol airport.

The full-body scanner "could have been helpful in this case, absolutely," said Evert van Zwol, head of the Dutch Pilots Association.

But the technology has raised significant concerns among privacy watchdogs because it can show the body's contours with embarrassing clarity. Those fears have slowed the introduction of the machines.

Jay Stanley, public education director for the American Civil Liberties Union's Technology and Liberty Program, said the machines essentially perform "virtual strip searches that see through your clothing and reveal the size and shape of your body."

Abdulmutallab passed through a routine security check at the gate in Amsterdam before boarding, officials said. He is believed to have tucked into his trousers or underwear a small bag holding PETN explosive powder, and possibly a liquid detonator.

Because such items won't set off metal detectors, the U.S. Transportation Security Administration, part of the Department of Homeland Security, has begun installing two types of advanced scanning machines that provide a more detailed picture.

These machines, which can cost six figures each, screen airline passengers without physical contact. They can reveal plastic or chemical explosives and non-metallic weapons.

Such scanners "provide the best protection for the widest range of threats," said Joe Reiss, vice president of marketing for American Science & Engineering Inc. The company makes machines for prisons, military agencies, foreign customs patrols and other customers but does not have a contract with TSA.

TSA has deployed 40 "millimeter wave" machines, which use radio waves to produce a three-dimensional image based on energy reflected back from the body.

Six of those machines, which are made by L-3 Communications Holdings Inc., are being used for what TSA calls "primary screenings" at six U.S. airports: Albuquerque, N.M.; Las Vegas; Miami; San Francisco; Salt Lake City; and Tulsa, Okla.

This means passengers go through the scans instead of a metal detector, although they can elect to receive a pat-down search from a security officer instead.

The remainder of the machines are being used at 13 U.S. airports for secondary screening of passengers who set off a metal detector: Atlanta; Baltimore/Washington; Denver; Dallas/Fort Worth; Indianapolis; Jacksonville and Tampa, Fla.; Los Angeles; Phoenix; Raleigh-Durham, N.C.; Richmond, Va.; Ronald Reagan Washington National; and Detroit. Travelers can opt for a pat-down instead in those instances as well.

The agency also says it has bought 150 "backscatter" machines, which use low-level X-rays to create a two-dimensional image of the body, from Rapiscan Systems, a unit of OSI Systems Inc. Those machines, which cost $190,000 each, are expected to be deployed in U.S. airports in 2010.

"The machine gives a very accurate and very precise image of things on the body that are not the body," said Peter Kant, executive vice president of global government affairs for Rapiscan.

Last June, however, because of privacy concerns, the House voted 310-118 to prohibit the use of whole-body imaging for primary screening. The measure, still pending in the Senate, would limit the use of the devices to secondary screening.

"As a society, we're going to have to figure out the balance between personal privacy and the need to secure an aircraft," said Rep. Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah, who sponsored the measure. "And there is no easy answer."

Executives at the companies that make the machines insist there are ways to strike that balance.

Kant said the technology has evolved enough to produce body images that look like chalk outlines. In addition, privacy filters can blur faces, noted Colin McSeveny, communications manager for Smiths Detection, a British company that makes millimeter wave machines that are being tested in Europe and the U.S.

For its part, TSA said it safeguards privacy by ensuring that all full-body images are viewed in a walled-off location not visible to the public. In addition, the security officer assisting the passenger cannot view the image and the officer who views the image never sees the passenger. Also, the machines cannot store, print or transmit any images they produce.

After all, McSeveny said, "all they are looking for is something that shouldn't be there."

In addition to the scanning machines in place or recently purchased by TSA, the agency says it plans to buy 300 more.

The European Union Parliament, however, voted in October 2008 for more study of privacy before authorizing the machines' full deployment in European airports.

Amsterdam's airport has been running a test project with full-body scanners for three years, mainly for a few European flights. One machine being tested there for the past five weeks, made by L-3, is designed to enhance passengers' privacy by having software, rather than a human, analyze the image generated by the scanner. If the software detects an anomaly — something strapped to a leg, for instance — it alerts a human screener to look at the person's leg directly.

"So nobody sees any images," said Ron Louwerse, the airport's chief of security. "The results are very, very good. I'm very confident about it."

In May, TSA abandoned "puffer machines" made by General Electric Co. and Smiths Detection, which blew air onto passengers to dislodge trace amounts of explosives. The government said the machines cost too much to maintain and regularly broke down when exposed to dirt or humidity. There are still 18 puffer machines deployed at U.S. airports.

___

It would be much less drain on our economy if all passengers were to be transported in full shackles. No more need for TSA. You get in the plane and you get cuffed to the seat in front of you both feet and hands. Problem solved.

Call me a racist pig, but if you stop letting them on a plane, they can't bomb us.

So the current administration can pass a stimulus bill worth 787 billion full of porky projects but can't put out a couple of billion for screening machines that will save lives.

I like that idea. They don't seem to have terrorists on those planes. Hmmm, I wonder why that is????

You are a racist pig with embarrassingly simple "solutions". Can I put you in the "they" group?

Everybody is a "they" to somebody.

They were 1 of 3 countries that " bid " on taking over airport security.

Congress thought the american people wouldn't take kindly to the "same people "protecting us that bombed us

What's your solution, Rehabilitation? Let's do it at your house then!

I ain't gonna lie, the whole thing makes me a lot less enthusiastic about flying.

At the moment I kinda' like Israel's approach to airline security, and it's no secret that I'm often critical of Israel, or more accurately, it's government. They profile passengers, review flight manifests, both inbound and outbound, and have a sky marshal on all El Al airplanes armed and trained to shoot any ne'er-do-wells, which is so common sensical that must be why no one else does it. And you don't have to remove your shoes, your belt, and you can carry on liquids because if you were a threat they wouldn't let you on the plane in the first place. And if you still turn out to be a threat, the sky marshal takes you out.

Sg