TSA Epic Fails

[Torakus]

How many TSA employees since inception have ever done jail time for something they did while on duty?
Now, how many cops have done jail time since the TSA's inception, for something they did while on duty?

Apples and Oranges. TSA screener are not Law Enforcement Officers.

A closer comparison would be to compare the rates of incarceration of TSA employees to the rates of incarceration of other federal employees. For other purposes like injury rates, the screeners are compared to their civilian counter parts in the aviation baggage and cargo handling sector. Perhaps that is a better comparison yet.

Still you have not taken far enough. What laws are you speaking of? Laws against theft? Screeners have done time for stealing on the job. Laws against rape. Screeners have done time for that. Murder? Well I don't think that has happened, though a screener was murdered at work last year (domestic). Assault? Yep, there have been screeners do jail time for assault (against fellow screeners or management though, not passengers). Smuggling narcotics? Yep, far too many have been jailed for this.

So I guess I am just not seeing what laws you see being broken. Just to be clear, it is not against the law to be an asshole douchebag. I would be writing this from San Quentin if that were the case. TSOs are protected by their union and TSAs discipline policy for breaches of policy, not law. When a criminal act is discovered TSA turns them over to local law enforcement immediately and in some cases federal LE will open cases against them as well.

[Torakus]

http://www.washingtontimes.com/blog/ins ... essive-in/

Good god, just when I think teh TSA couldn't acheive new heights on Mt. Retard, this comes in.

Is there no common sense applied in that agency? For fuck's sake.

Ah, the security camera footage has been reviewed and once again Embar's rush to smear TSA screeners, only serves to embarrass him. Turns out Duncan Hunter didn't have the whole story.

The entire screening took less than eight (8) minutes. It was conducted by two TSOs who happened to be veterans. NO prosthetic was ever removed.

Ok, so I have not seen the video myself, but I doubt PHX is lying since the video isn't exempt from FOIA requests.

[Embar Angylwrath]

I call bullshit on that rigid internal accountability meme. If that were the case, the entire management and screening staff at Newark would have been fired a long time ago. Its failure rate is in the toilet and has been for a long time. TSA didn't manage to keep the lid on the tester getting bombs through the screeners every time he attempted to do it.

[Torakus]

I call bullshit on that rigid internal accountability meme

Last year, 52 EWR screeners were fired and another 19 disciplined for major security lapses and thefts. The senior management has turned over multiple times. If I remember I will look back through my records and see how many FSD's they have gone through there. How many people do you employ and how many do you have to let go for cause each year? Is 4% too high or too low. Either TSA isn't holding folks accountable, or TSA is and they have a lot of shit bird employees.

keep the lid on the tester getting bombs through the screeners every time he attempted to do it.

He only tried to get through once and he made it. The reports say he made it through the walk through metal detector and then a pat down. This doesn't make a whole lot of sense. If he did not alarm the WTMD then there is no reason to pat him down. If however it was the AIT that he walked through, and we don't know for sure since the "source" is anonymous, then it obviously did its job and detected the anomaly, triggering a pat down of that area. At that point the failure occurs with the screener not performing a proper pat down of the area. Two other tester also supposedly made it through with fake IEDs and a fourth tester was detected, but once again all we have is an anonymous source telling us this. That same team is reported to have tested the checkpoint at another terminal on the same day; have not heard of any failures.

Its failure rate is in the toilet

Please feel free to back that up with something more substantial than a quote from an anonymous disgruntled former screener from EWR, who was probably fired for being a douche bag anyway.

Oh BTW, one of our TSS-E's in Guam, you know one of our dirt bag employees who couldn't get hired at McDonalds, interrupted an assault and saved a woman's life this week.

[Embar Angylwrath]

And a McDonalds employee saves a life, so?
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/video/2 ... chip-video

And here's where a homeless guy saves a cop.
http://dfw.cbslocal.com/2012/10/23/excl ... om-attack/

I'll warrant that a google search on "homeless person saves life" turns up more hits than "TSA person saves life." Is your point that the TSA, McDonalds employees and homeless people are all of the same caliber because some of them were in situations where they helped someone else?

http://www.economist.com/blogs/gulliver ... _detection

According to Pistole, some airports are close to 100% failure rates....

[Torakus]

I'll warrant that a google search on "homeless person saves life" turns up more hits than "TSA person saves life." Is your point that the TSA, McDonalds employees and homeless people are all of the same caliber because some of them were in situations where they helped someone else?

It all sort of points back at the asshole who lumps all of these folks together as less than acceptable eh? (that would be you being the asshole).

http://www.economist.com/blogs/gulliver ... _detection

According to Pistole, some airports are close to 100% failure rates....

You are beyond fucking loony if you really got that out of what Administrator Pistole said. The hilarious part is that TSA is in a no win situation here. If TSA makes the tests easy and the screeners pass 100% of the time, then the Embars of the world scream "TSA is just security theater!"; but if they make the tests difficult and the screeners don't pass 100% the Embars of the world scream "TSA screeners are so stupid they couldn't get a job at McDonalds!".

Well I found 35,000,000 responses for "douche saves life" but I am sure they weren't all referring to you Embar.

[Fallakin Kuvari]

It's just "Sexcurity Theater"; Why else would you want to see someones naked body through some sort of scanning system?

[Embar Angylwrath]

@Tora - You didn't answer the question Tora, at least not in a direct and honest fashion. You point to random events where some TSA person helped another person, and then use that singular event to paint the entire TSA staff as some kind of "throw themselves on the grenade" bravery group.

The TSA isn't in a nop win situation because of the tests. They are in a no win situation because they aren't effective. Its really laugable when you say that not detecting someone walking through security with a bomb strapped to them is somehow an exceedingly difficult task. What about the guns that get through. Or even the goddam claymores that accidently went through? Those didn't get through because of some tester using a sekret strat, they got through because a couple of Armey people forgot they had them in luggage, and TSA couldn't see two, very large, explosive devices (inactivated) on tehir screen.

I will give you this though, they are pretty good at saving us from bottled water.

[Embar Angylwrath]

[Freecare Spiritwise]

Until the day there's TSA checkpoints on the freeway...

[Torakus]

Its really laugable when you say that not detecting someone walking through security with a bomb strapped to them is somehow an exceedingly difficult task.

The "bombs" aren't the cartoonish suicide vests that you seem to envision. The explosives guys make some very creative fake IEDs and equally creative concealments for them. And still the vast majority of them are detected.

Or even the goddam claymores that accidently went through?

Still telling that story I see. The lady that made this claim was full of shit. I have colleagues who worked with her at Picatinny and they agree that she is full of shit and made it up. And for the record it was an inert claymore and TSA found it. Her claim that co-workers went through ahead of her with the same thing undetected was crap then and remains crap to this day.

What about the guns that get through.

Half a dozen incidents in a couple years? Compare that the the thousands of firearms that are detected. Contrast it with the millions of people screened. I think they are doing fine.

It's just "Sexcurity Theater"; Why else would you want to see someones naked body through some sort of scanning system?

The last of this type of imaging will be gone in a couple months. Current AIT only show an outline person. When they detect something they don't even show that image, it just shows a box on the stick figure's body part where the screener needs to pat down.

The bag limits liquid volumes. I don't know if one quart of the right liquids mixed could be enough to bring down and airplane, but it seems legit.

[Ddrak]

The bag limits liquid volumes. I don't know if one quart of the right liquids mixed could be enough to bring down and airplane, but it seems legit.

I'd say a quart of Astrolite-A would make a mess of a plane, but you need a detonator to set it off (the hard bit). It's like it doesn't really matter if someone takes a whole suitcase full of PETN on a plane because detonating the stuff is non-trivial.

A suitcase full of silver fulminate however, would be an impressive feat in itself and would be dangerous on a plane!

Dd

[Torakus]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/7536167.stm

This hydrogen peroxide based bomb was commissioned by the BBC. They had explosives engineer, Sidney Alford, create it using ingredients and techniques that a group of British terrorists who happened to be Muslims (trying not to be insensitive) planned to use (also the same method used to kill over 50 people using backpack bombs in London in 2005). British police arrested them early on in their scheme and they were eventually acquitted, but their plot to blow up planes with this concoction was what started the liquids ban.

So considering the ease with which this explosive is mixed and the relatively small amount required to cause significant damage, and the fact that you can google how to make one and get thousands of results, I think the liquids limits are reasonable enough.

[Embar Angylwrath]

How do you know guns got through security only a half dozen times in a couple of years? Those are only the ones you know about, and you only know about it because the people who got them through said something about it. You don't know (and neither do I), how many got through and the people kept their mouths shut about it. But I think we can both agree its the larger group, since the ones who crow about it are the minor subset.

[Torakus]

How do you know guns got through security only a half dozen times in a couple of years? Those are only the ones you know about, and you only know about it because the people who got them through said something about it. You don't know (and neither do I), how many got through and the people kept their mouths shut about it. But I think we can both agree its the larger group, since the ones who crow about it are the minor subset.

Actually I am even counting the ones where there is no evidence that the person got through but are caught on the return trip and claim that they brought it with them. There is going to be some failure rate, but I think it is very small. Many people who have pistols in their carry on luggage have legitimately forgotten them there, or are stupid enough to not know the rules. It is probably a tiny fraction of these folks who slip by an inattentive x-ray operator because they are not trying to sneak it through so there are no other signs for the BDOs and LEOs to pick up on. Frankly there are enough eyes on the screener that I don't think there is some larger group getting through but staying quiet about it. Pretty hard to put a number on something that is defined by it being unknowable though, eh? The fact remains that we hear about one or two getting through per year. So TSA screens 657,000,000 passengers per year, over 2,000,000,000 pieces of carry on luggage, checked luggage, and cargo; and only 1 or 2 fire arms make it through? I am ok with that failure rate. I wish it was 0 but until the x-ray itself can detect firearms or other dangerous items with some type of ATR (automatic threat recognition) technology then we have to live with some failures.

[Freecare Spiritwise]

I'm curious whether you even acknowledge the overwhelmingly negative perception of the TSA by the public, and if so, why you feel the public has that perception.

I was taught by my corporate masters that perception is reality, and that it is absolutely vital for an organization to cultivate and manage that perception. The health of the organization depends on a positive perception. The best I can tell, the TSA as an organizational entity is not self-aware. How else to explain its seeming disregard for the negative perception by the public? Hubris would be my second guess, or maybe a combination of the two.

There's been nothing in this thread that has made me think: "maybe my negative perception is wrong."

[Torakus]

I'm curious whether you even acknowledge the overwhelmingly negative perception of the TSA by the public, and if so, why you feel the public has that perception.

I was taught by my corporate masters that perception is reality, and that it is absolutely vital for an organization to cultivate and manage that perception. The health of the organization depends on a positive perception. The best I can tell, the TSA as an organizational entity is not self-aware. How else to explain its seeming disregard for the negative perception by the public? Hubris would be my second guess, or maybe a combination of the two.

There's been nothing in this thread that has made me think: "maybe my negative perception is wrong."

Frankly I do not know. TSA has an internal Idea Factory and I think that the most common recommendation from the workforce to management is to figure out a way to improve that public perception. Why TSA doesn't do a better job at PR or perception grooming? I still don't know. Hubris? Perhaps. Many of us in middle and senior management are old military guys who long ago realized that perception is very rarely even close to reality but just don't give a fuck and are of the opinion that people who can't tell the difference are too stupid to be bothered with.

Is TSA self aware? I think that answer is yes and no and it doesn't matter.

Yes - The people most people hate (TSOs) are actually the most self aware and are constantly banging the drum trying to get management to do better PR.
No - Many, mostly middle and senior management types, just don't care anymore and that it influenced by large doses of reality and a side of what follows below:
It just doesn't matter - Even if all of the manager, directors, assistant administrators and the administrator were all on board and wanted to go on a full out PR blitz, change procedures, actually involve the public in policy and procedure development, or whatever else it would take to change that public perception, it all gets shat upon by the people who actually make (approve or disapprove) all of the decisions that make a difference anyway; Congress, who then duck and dodge and never take an ounce of blame for TSA simply enforcing the laws that Congress put into place and via the procedures that Congress has mandated. But the general public doesn't give a shit, because they want to hold someone accountable and if you want to see a group of assholes who are never held accountable for anything, look no further than Congress.

/I said good DAY sir!

You mean this overwhelming negative perception?
http://www.gallup.com/poll/156491/ameri ... ative.aspx
http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_ ... e_than_tsa
http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-503544_162- ... 03544.html
http://pollposition.com/2012/01/25/amer ... for-tsa-c/

or just those blogs that fit your particular perception?

[Freecare Spiritwise]

I'm right there with you about Congress. I think Obama is a mediocre president at best, but at least you could make the argument that he's functioning in the capacity of president. I think most of our elected representatives are just dead weight. We'd have a more effective legislative branch if we gave monkeys random number generators. The whole damn system is broken.

[Ddrak]

Many of us in middle and senior management are old military guys who long ago realized that perception is very rarely even close to reality but just don't give a fuck and are of the opinion that people who can't tell the difference are too stupid to be bothered with.

I was going to make a comment about the line between perception and reality in civilian space not necessarily being where a military trained person would believe it, but realized there's no point given Tora's right about Congress being the real problem.

Dd

[Ddrak]

Long, but interesting...

(how to make some extremely effective weapons from the stuff you can buy after the TSA check)



Dd