Passenger with gun made it through TSA checkpoint in Atlanta and onto Delta flight

The Washington Post Democracy Dies in Darkness Try 1 month for $1 Sign In Newsletters & Alerts Gift Subscriptions Contact Us Help Desk Gridlock Passenger with gun made it through TSA checkpoint in Atlanta and onto Delta flight TSA denied that the lapse was due to staffing shortages related to the government shutdown.

A Transportation Security Administration employee checks in travelers at Hartsfield Jackson Atlanta International Airport on Jan. 7. (John Bazemore/AP) By Faiz Siddiqui January 13 at 11:17 PM A passenger made it through a Transportation Security Administration checkpoint with a gun on Jan. 2, boarding a Delta Air Lines flight at Atlanta Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport and flying to Tokyo, authorities said Sunday.

TSA confirmed the incident in a statement Sunday night but denied it was related to callouts stemming from the government shutdown, as hundreds of airport screeners are working without regular pay.

“TSA has determined standard procedures were not followed and a passenger did in fact pass through a standard screening TSA checkpoint with a firearm,” the agency said of the incident. “TSA has held those responsible appropriately accountable.”

My wife and I both worked for the feds during my years after my active duty retirement. I was also a contract evaluator in that second career.

My wife was described as a government contractor. There is a tremendous amount of determinations worded in a contract with Uncle Sugar that create a tremendous amount of error capacity. A perfect example of it, and I believe this as I have worked in security before, is the TSA people running short during shifts and someone got by with contraband, in this case a gun. They will do the same thing with military operations, going short just to get by and not get a good job done by using the term essential personnel.

Everything will be scrutinized by more sources thus every little idea will be implemented at every location. I guess the best way to say it is, “Too many cooks.....” And that would include local determinations by contract rather by a wide area of control that either attempt would take months to implement. If you research government contracts currently in place it would shock you how screwed up they are.

rwood

“private or government,that people are involved, things will be screwed up.”

Why set an expectation of failure? Why look past it? When these people fail people can die. If I see someone getting screwed up when it involves my safety, I’m going to say something about it. The difference is that I spent a lot of years training, overseeing, and inspecting operations like this in and for the military in multiple branches. Getting people killed for a lack of focus or knowledge is not an option, it is a purposeful screw up. I don’t expect that or condone it. You shouldn’t either. A dead person can’t say, “Oh well....”

rwood

The federal landscape is littered with failed projects. Some are huge, complex projects that grab lots of headlines; others never see the light of day. Contractor over promising capabilities and execution was the most frequently-cited reason for failure at some level. And the inflexibility and failed oversight also is in the loop.

Here is an example of problems that are consistent with government contracts from Insider Reports and I have seen errors like these before with some of the contracts I evaluated:

Agency changes requirements/scope after award: 39 percent

Poor communication between the agency and contractor: 36 percent

Lack of agency oversight: 36 percent

Contractor slow to staff or under staffs the project: 36 percent

Changes in agency leadership/commitment: 35 percent

Contractor uses inexperienced personnel: 34 percent

Contractor mismanagement: 32 percent

This isn’t all of them, just the ones that are a direct failure of the actual needs of the function they reviewed and how. And they are not uncommon at all as you can see by the percentages of over failure of the contracts evaluated. Plus the percentage of mistakes shown to the public are really only seen when the media uses them. When a gun gets past into an aircraft it’s news so it is used. It is a weapon to use against Trump blaming the shutdown. Whether it is his fault or not.

One other thing, the assignment of the contracts can also be in question. In 2012, when the Tricare military health program contract ran out and was due for rebidding by everyone, Triwest, the company that had the contract, and was not sighted for any major errors during their duration, had the lowest dollar bid of those that bid like United Health Care, Humana, Group Health, Health Net, and many others. But United Health Care got the contact with a bid of a little over $200 million higher than Triwest and they had absolutely no experience in military health care. Ultimately they had to hire Health Net to set up and train their people for their computer capacity using Health Net’s old programs because they had none of their own. Try finding that one on the sites.

Of course it helps that the POTUS at that time, Obama, had represented United while he was an attorney/activist in Chicago prior to his political aspirations. Graft they name is Barrack.

So government contracting is volatile and another loop in the system by adding any local indulgence, is a map for disaster with a separate entity program like TSA locations. Just the efforts toward continuity would be a Mongolian by itself with the thousands of airport needs we currently have. It isn’t just the big ones like the major cities have. It would be a mess.

rwood

“Privatizing the TSA wouldn’t be that difficult.”

Try covering 15,000 airports with oversee, training requirements, regulations, testing and location needs with a local group of people that were overwhelmed to begin with.

During the week of Dec. 10, 2018, the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) discovered 78 firearms that travelers were attempting to get past screening checkpoints. The guns were primarily 9mm semi-automatics, with a smattering of .38s, .22s, and .40-caliber Glocks. The TSA reports that 63 of the weapons were loaded, and 28 had a round chambered. This is in a week. And the intent of this “service” is not to catch them, it is to deter them from trying. Having to catch them because they might get away with it, is a lost cause. And each time a gun is discovered, it just affected the travel of thousands of people in a busy airport when they had to clear the terminal and held flights for inspections that affected the aircraft down the road. This is one case where an ounce of prevention......

rwood

“They have reserves and military to cover the TSA and air traffic controllers.”

There are a few reasons they created the contract for TSA to begin with to keep the military off the public domain check points, baggage handlers, inspectors, and all levels of supervisors, and into the field.

First and foremost, the list of employment needs for 15,000 airports would cost many billion of dollars a year that would be charged to taxpayers. In 2013, in an article from City Lab, it was $7.6 billion. For that you get what you have, if done right, and the stability of career people that should be concerned about their job. Not military personnel that have to disappear, permanent change of station (PCS) every few years and go temporary duty (TDY) at any time for short term business. That means cost and a lack of continuity.

Military’s main job is to fight to protect. They are not peacekeepers like the libs have tried to make us. And back filling check point slots with military paid at a whole lot less than their counterparts for extended times is not going to be a big morale kudo based upon wages and will cause a lack of focus for the military member due to frustrations of trying to make a living for their families. And more guns will get by. They can’t just quit when they are getting used, they have to wait until their contract finishes.

The DOd would have to create a career field for the services for instructions, training, and implementaion of the positions at all levels like everything they do now. Taxpayer cost, time, and deployment would be slow and expensive. It took God 6 days to create the heavens and earth, it will take the government years to get this one done. By that time, there won’t be a plane in the air.

rwood

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