Facts matter: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter. Support our nonprofit reporting. Subscribe to our print magazine.
The Transportation Security Administration said today that during tests last year, screeners in major airports across the country allowed dummy bomb components to sail through security up to 75 percent of the time. San Francisco airport, which uses privately contracted screeners, did the best of all the test sites with only a 20% failure rate.
Due to last year’s poor performance, TSA now runs drills continuously at every airport in the country, planting fake bomb parts sometimes no larger than a pen cap (next week: no pens on planes!). Screeners who fail must undergo remedial training. Personally, I’d prefer it if they just trained them right the first time. In the meantime, can I have my damn shoes back?
—Casey Miner
