Shoes will have to be taken off at U.S. air ports for a while yet

DHS secretary Janet Napolitano said Tuesday that technology currently available does not allow screeners adequately to examine what is in someone’s shoes while the person is wearing them. While that could change one day, for now the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) does not have plans to end the shoe-removal requirement, which was implemented after Richard Reid tried but failed to ignite a shoe bomb on a U.S.-bound trans-Atlantic jetliner in 2001.

AP reports that Napolitano spoke in a live online video chat with travelers about the Obama administration’s aviation security efforts.

Napolitano said officials are focused on making the public aware of the security measures and comfortable with them. She was asked about air marshals on aircraft and the prohibition against people without tickets going through security and meeting arriving passengers at their gates. Napolitano said she doesn’t know if air marshals will one day be on every international flight. On the gate area issue, she said the gate is designed to be a secure area where only ticketed passengers are allowed.

“It may be possible to change that as we move forward, but right now I can’t say that,” Napolitano said.