House bill delays 100 percent freight-container inspection

In a visit last week to the Los Angeles-Long Beach port, DHS secretary vowed that it would not be long before all U.S.-bound freight containers are scanned for radioctive materials. The Democrats in Congress have been calling for a 100 percent inspection for years. If you read the fine print of the bill which emerged a U.S. House of Representatives/Senate panel, you will see that the bill calls for the testing new scanning technologies to be completed before requiring inspections on cargo. This means, writes Air Cargo News’s Goeffrey Arend, that the House Transportation Security Bill from this past January which “would have required all cargo on passenger jets be inspected within three years and all U.S.-bound maritime cargo to be scanned for nuclear bomb components within five years may be out the window, finished.”

No technology for such scanning exists at a reasonable cost is the thought, although pilot projects and various feasibility studies are ongoing. Screening air cargo would cost $3.6 billion over the next decade and screening all ship cargo would cost even more, maybe hundreds of billions. Lawmakers have agreed to allow the U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security to waive the mandate in two-year increments. Also, DHS secretary will have to certify that whatever scanning system is decided upon meets technological and logistical requirements.

We note that Senators Daniel Inouye (D-Hawaii), chairman of the Commerce Committee, and Joseph Lieberman (I-Connecticut), chairman of the homeland security committee, had urged that tests on the new technology be completed before inspections are required of 100 percent of cargo.