TSA bolsters airport scanning
The U.S. Transportation Security Administration (TSA) is now swabbing the hands of some passengers for traces of explosives; also, explosive detection machines are put on carts and rolled down the concourses to boarding areas, randomly rescreening passengers who are already in the “sterile area” of the airport
U.S. airport security screeners are expanding the use of equipment to detect residues of explosives, swabbing the hands of passengers as well as their carry-on items, the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) said Wednesday. New York Times’s Matthew Wald writes that for years, screeners have run a swab over carry-ons, often focusing on handles or zippers or other spots that a passenger is likely to have touched. The swab is then put into a machine that sucks out whatever it has picked up, and looks for molecules of substances used in explosives. Now, according to the agency, screeners will use swabs on hands as well. “This additional screening measure could take place at the security checkpoint, in the checkpoint queue, or boarding areas,” the agency said.
There are other security measures taken since the failed Christmas Day bombing. TSA will be putting explosives detectors on carts, then roll them down the concourses to boarding areas, randomly rescreening passengers who are already in the “sterile area” of the airport. Wald quotes the agency to say that this was part of “our layered approach to aviation security.” Since the screening is random, “passengers should not expect to see the same thing at every airport or each time they travel,” it said.
The agency is also accelerating the introduction of whole-body scanners (nearly 1,000 of them will be deployed at U.S. airports by the end of 2011), hand-held scanners, explosive-sniffing dogs, and behavior observation officers.
