AP: Under pressure to prevent people from sneaking onto runways and planes at major U.S. airports, authorities are cracking down — not on the intruders who slip through perimeter gates or jump over fences, but on the release of information about the breaches.
A year after an Associated Press investigation first revealed persistent problems with airports’ outer defenses, breaches remain as frequent as ever — about once every 10 days — despite some investments to fortify the nation’s airfields. As Americans wait in ever-longer security screening lines inside terminals, new documents show dozens more incidents happening outside perimeters than airports have disclosed.
At the same time, leaders at some airports and the U.S. Transportation Security Administration are saying some of the 345 incidents AP found shouldn’t count as security breaches, even when intruders got deep into secure areas.
Was it a perimeter security breach in March 2015 when a woman walked past a vehicle exit gate at San Francisco International Airport and onto the tarmac, where she tried to flag down a jet for a trip home to Guatemala? No it was not, said the airport and TSA officials, who also tried to suppress information about the case. more
Im a big fan of the old black and white TV series. We get a cable station that plays them non stop and I’ve really gotten hooked on The Thin Man with Peter Lawford.
One episode showed them boarding a plane right off the tarmac and paying their fare after they had been seated. We’ve come so far. In the wrong direction.
@Bad_Brad, everyone is treated like the least common denominator. It’s why 99.8% of us need to suffer in order to maintain the status quo of the 0.2% of transvestites.
eternal, I think it’s even worse than you describe. TSA avoids checking people from the Middle East because that might be construed as Profiling. Wouldn’t want to do that now would we?
I’ll tell you what is even worse. Baggage handlers, caterers, maintenance personnel, etc, come and go like they are the CEO. Take a look around next time you are at the airport and you will see a bunch of people you wouldn’t invite to your house for dinner.
Brad – On a few occasions in the 60s I walked through National Airport (now Reagan Nat’l), never stopping – or being stopped – then through the gate, onto the apron, and then board an Eastern Airlines jet. I’d sit down and, on the hour, the stewardess (not yet flight attendant) would come by and take my $20 bill, no ID check, and we’d all then fly safely to New York. That shuttle flew on the hour every hour during weekdays.
On at least one occasion I saw a passenger board and then stow his hard shell rifle case overhead.
O.T. New Froglegs up.
bb and eternal, case in point
i was in dc right after 9/11, security was a mess
after all of the extra checks, i was in line at the gate, and “randomly” pulled out for an extra body search, belt and pants undone, etc in front of all the others
directly behind me was a group of muslims, in full garb, went straight through the gate to board
i told these guys while my arms were out, exposing myself, you are fucking kidding me, you pull out a combat vet, eagle scout, no criminal record, white christian, and let those through
ayfkm
and we have not changed policy
insanity prevails
@:
I was scheduled for a meeting with a large Aerospace Company in Tuscon AZ on 9-12. Obviously that didn’t happen. They wanted me out there bad so the first day planes were flying I was on a South West flight. I think there might have been a total of 10 people on that flight. Long story short, first meeting was delayed because a pager was going off in a parked car. So they had the bomb squad out there ripping the car apart. They had the entire building evacuated.Next stop, different facility. I pull up and there’s more LEO than I’ve ever seen in one place. Three Muslim looking men were taking pictures of the front of this building (weird). But they had the hog tied and were searching everything they could search. There’s got to e a better way to deal with this problem.
Some used to skip high school and go out to the observation deck at National Airport, smoke dope, and watch the airplanes take off and land.
For a real thrill some of the guys would drop acid and then go lay in the weeds at the end of the runway. The plane roaring over you was (alleged to be) a real trip.
Not that I’d know anything about that, of course …
We live in a different world … not necessarily a better world …
izlamo delenda est …
@Bad_Brad, @:,
Well, same f**ked up situation when I glide right thru pre-check (without actual pre-check) just because I have my kids.
When I fly alone, I go thru the gen. pop., right up to the body scanners and tell them I opt out. They make me sit there for a half hour “to find someone to pat me down.” When that someone finally comes, he makes me go around the metal detector (the same metal detector that every third person goes thru because the body scanner is too slow to keep up), to the groin check area, with my belt and shoes on.
Every government process is the worst, until they drag me through a new process.
Maybe next time I’ll put a dress on and grow out my face, and wear a cup.
I rarely fly anymore. Maybe twice in the last 10 years. But next time I do, I’m dressing up like a Muslim woman.
bb, i recommend as a muslim woman with a penis
https://www.facebook.com/askrocco/videos/10153756162167716/?pnref=story
We are in a heap of trouble.
@Tim – Are you referring to Lady Bird Park? It is on the Potomac less than a mile from the runway at National. There was a large statue of sea birds and a breaking wave. We’d sit or lie in the wave and watch the planes. Some (ahem) of us weren’t exactly sober.
Arrgh – it has been a very long time. The wave statue is the Navy – Merchant Marine Memorial, and although you get to it from Lady Bird Park, it is a separate thing. Now that it all comes back to me, it is quite moving and worth a visit.
I don’t see the problem.
The TSA is fantastically successful, very few government operations can match their success.
I suspect some here have the bizarre idea that the TSA exists to provide security at airports. Nothing could be further from the truth. They exist to extract money from taxpayers, nothing more and nothing less.
That is why they ignore bombs and the like. Terrorist attacks make it easier for them to get funding increases.