Folks, we’ve been had, but good, again. In digging through the nuts and bolts of what has occurred in the security system we thought we had installed in our airports, it will become clear what political expediency has done for us. In 1998-99, in the age of trendy “feel good” responses only for show, was a real dilly led by the newly psuedo-hip, bearded Al Gore called the “Gore Commission on Aviation Safety and Security.”
What did this commission actually do? It briefly added an effort to train people and equip security points, but for only as long as the media’s cameras were running, then they closed up shop and moved their traveling circus to another arena that needed “fixing” for their pet talking heads. The results of these now bankrupt notions of leadership as theater were horrifyingly shown to us in New York and Washington just last month.
Let me spell it out for you:
Of the three types of machines approved by Gore’s commission to sniff explosives, only two types actually work well. The FAA is and has been aware of the deficiency but does nothing to correct the problem so as not to rock their boat.
In an enviable example of bureaucratic showmanship, the FAA has created the “Federal Aviation Administration for Security Equipment Integration Product Team (IPT).” Wonderfully impressive title is it not? Unfortunately the people selected to do the job don’t have a clue as to how the training needs to be done in order to create a useful effect. One of their earliest edicts was to reduce the size of the training team by more than half. One of these newly hired IPT wonders is the one who is trying to bring that poorly functioning explosives trace machine into the system.
In 1999 there was a real drive to train people on this new gear using some sensible criteria, but not any longer. FAA officials now receive bonuses for cutting expenses, and that very same security training was a very early victim of that FAA management mindset starting in fiscal year 2000. When you consider the up to 200 percent industry turnover rate created because the security line personnel are paid substantially less than the local teenagers who flip burgers, the worthlessness of those expenditures is obvious. It is as effective an approach as trying to write your name on the surf. If you want competence then you have to retain competence, or else face an uncontrolled hemorrhage in training expenditures with a near zero return. Management 101. …
What of the recent FAA actions? In issuing their 1998 Security Amendment concerning the devices that find explosive traces, it would seem that they identified a need for competence and had codified the means to obtain it, wouldn’t it? This is not so if we are to pay attention to the actions of local FAA officials. Now they violate their own protocols daily and force trainers to ignore these edicts because “they said so.”
How about the training to produce competence in the airline’s Ground Security Coordinator? As envisioned, these people would have no less than two hours of classroom training on how to respond to alarms. Now they get almost nothing – that’s right, they aren’t told anything. The FAA and the airlines tried to force the trainers to say it wasn’t needed, but when this ploy failed, it was to be cut anyway.
We have seen much ado about the need to “screen” passengers, and it is a real concern, but then why does a screener employed by Delta Airlines admit that she is virtually untrained and utterly clueless as to what she needs to look for? That’s right, folks. Clueless. And that happened this past week. The security company’s screeners are supposed to have four hours of training plus on-the-job training, so what is this airline doing putting this self-admitted twit there?
While the passengers see only those measures in their areas, a major concern is who has access to the aircraft on the ground. With folks in charge like the passenger screener just referred to, it takes little imagination to form a telling picture of what is happening there as well.
The fix for this system is not that hard, really; it simply takes a bit of skull sweat and determination, combined with a willingness to abandon the bureaucratic mindset. If the overall airport security system becomes federalized these options will simply evaporate and we will be blown away to the never-never land where political expediency and correctness reign. Forget about cost-effectiveness and quickly replacing the incompetent if they all become (nearly impossible to fire) government employees.
But for right now a hammer is obviously needed to force the issues for all parties, so why not consider the use of a separate outside agency, one contracted by and reporting directly to Homeland Defense and not the FAA, airports or airlines? That approach could implement actions that hold any and all appropriate feet to the fire, regardless of rank or organization. We need to produce a pragmatic culture transformation and as the examples above indicate, it is badly needed, and not just for airport security procedures either.
It’s high time that we abandon Gore’s conception of how to fix the problem and just do it, because we already knew how and now we surely know why.
Tom Marzullo was a Special Forces soldier during Vietnam serving both on an A-Team and in MACVSOG. He completed his career in the U.S. Navy aboard submarines and was assigned to submarine special operations. He resides in Denver, Colo., with his bride of 21 years and their daughter.
