Loaded Firearms Passes Through Airport Security Undetected
WASHINGTON (CNN) — A passenger who went through an airport security checkpoint — before remembering that he had a loaded gun — is facing charges after going back to report his error, authorities said. (Link)
The TSA is very lucky that this man indeed made a mistake and that he was not someone who could have posed danger to the airport — or even worse on board an airplane. White said that 14 guns were discovered at checkpoints around the country last week. On average, screeners find two guns a day, he said.
“We know this is not a systemic problem in that our testing indicates TSOs [Transportation Security Officers] have a very high success rate at finding firearms. Given the high degree of reliability that our TSOs can find even carefully concealed firearms, we are evaluating every aspect of this incident,” White said
Unfortunately this type of situation is not one where ‘very good’ success rate is good enough. One slip up could cause a lot of damage. This is something that the TSA needs to put on the top of their list. They find around two guns per day — however we do not know how many guns that they miss per day. One would hope that the number is zero, but it is doubtful.
The TSA did one thing right in this situation — they placed the office on leave while running an investigation. Allowing a gun through the checkpoint is as much the officer’s fault as it is the passengers.
Justin
Tags: Airport, Firearms, security, TSA
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