Feel Safe? 25,000 Airport Security Breaches Since 9/11

By Debbie Schlussel

One guy had seven years and the other had three since 9/11 to fix this hole-ridden, phony airport security system. And both Presidents–Republican and Democrat–f–ked it up, all in the name of pandering to Muslims–you know, the only people who actually committed 9/11. With an average of seven security breaches per day at U.S. airports and 14,000 unauthorized people entering airports without having to go through security, how many of those are Muslim? How many will be successful in carrying out their jihadist missions in the future? We’re screwed, America.

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More than 25,000 security breaches — an average of about seven per day — have occurred at U.S. airports since November 2001, according to newly released Department of Homeland Security documents.

More than 14,000 were people entering “limited-access” areas by going through airport doors or passageways without permission, or unauthorized people going from airport buildings to planes, according to the documents.

Hey, looks like stripping 90-year-old grannies wearing diapers in wheel chairs and six-year-old blonde kids–all while Mohammed and Fatmeh are laughin’ their way to the runway untouched–is workin’ out real good, right?

The documents, obtained in advance by USA TODAY, were submitted to a House subcommittee on homeland security Wednesday. The documents don’t provide details about the security breaches or whether any could have led to potential attacks on planes or passengers.

The total number of infractions is small when compared with the large volume of traffic at the USA’s 450 major airports, which have served more than 5.5 billion fliers since 2001. But critics say there is still reason to worry.

“It’s clear the airports are not secure,” says Rep. Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah, chairman of the House Subcommittee on National Security, Homeland Defense and Foreign Operations. “For all the money, time and persistence we have thrown at airport security, it’s a real mess.”

Transportation Security Administration spokesman Nicholas Kimball said the breaches represent a tiny fraction of 1% of the air travelers who used U.S. airports in the past decade. The term “breach” is broadly defined and can mean accidental violations that pose no real danger to the public, he said. . . .

Testifying before a House Oversight and Government Reform subcommittee, the director of aviation at Charlotte Douglas International Airport, T.J. Orr, said the TSA is compromised by a “rigid attitude of arrogance and bureaucracy.” Orr was critical of the lengthy amount of time it takes to get the TSA to engage on something like a security assessment of the airport. . . .

The House subcommittee says it does not have a breakdown by year when the security breaches occurred, but former Federal Aviation Administration security director Billie Vincent says 25,000 security breaches indicates a problem.

“We’re open to penetration if someone decides to penetrate,” he says.

Vincent says, however, that more details are needed, such as what specifically occurred. Until such information is provided, fliers should only “be mildly concerned” about their safety, he says.

In 2006, tests by the TSA showed that security screeners at Los Angeles International Airport and Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport failed to find fake bombs hidden on undercover agents posing as passengers in more than 60% of tests, according to a classified report obtained by USA TODAY.

In 2003, five undercover Department of Homeland Security agents posing as passengers carried weapons undetected through several security checkpoints at Boston’s Logan International Airport.

Documents being introduced at Wednesday’s subcommittee hearing also show:

•6,000 security breaches in which Transportation Security Administration screeners failed to screen, or improperly screened, a passenger or a passenger’s carry-on items.

•2,616 security breaches involving an individual gaining unauthorized access to the “sterile area” at screening checkpoints or an exit lane without submitting to all screening procedures and inspections.

•1,026 incidents when someone gained unauthorized access to a sterile area but was “contained” or “constantly monitored” by airport or security personnel until apprehended.

•1,318 incidents in which someone gained unauthorized access from airport perimeters to aircraft operations or security identification display areas and was under constant surveillance until apprehended. . . .

“It’s absolutely stunning that the vulnerabilities are so wide,” Chaffetz says. “There’s not much to suggest that airports are more secure than years ago. We’ve just been lucky.”

Besides the security-breach data provided to the subcommittee, a Government Accountability Office report released Tuesday reveals other concerns about airport security and TSA oversight.

For example, the GAO says TSA plans to upgrade its explosive-detection devices for screening checked bags but “has not established an upgrade plan or conducted an analysis to determine what type of approach … is likely to be most feasible, efficient or effective.”

The GAO says that because TSA has not yet upgraded the screening devices, many of them “are only capable of detecting certain explosives.”

As I always say, TSA = Tough Shit America. Fly at your own risk. Flying while non-Muslim is the scariest experience of them all. For everyone else, it might just be the fastest way to 72 revirginized sharmutahs, with TSA in the piloting the trip.