Personally, if you've been fingerprinted and gone through a 10 year background check, along with random inspections while on airport property, I'd have no problem with you bringing liquids through a checkpoint, or even not taking off your shoes..

As another person pointed out, crew is exempt from the baggie/liquid/shoe rules as they have already been vetted.

coachrowsey, I'm trying to find the TSA reg on crews flying without going through security, and I haven't found it yet. I've seen signs at the airport by some of the checkpoints stating that fact, however. This was at MSP.

An NCIC check is not a criminal history. A "check" is just a query for active warrants. A criminal history is a III check (Interstate Identification Index), which discloses arrest history, and when available, conviction history. Furthermore, no justification is needed for a basic NCIC check, while a III requires documentation on who ran the check, the reason for the check, incident number, etc.

I've run about 7 billion NCIC checks. It is not a wants or warrants, its criminal history, stolen vehicle, runaway, etc.

http://www.fas.org/irp/agency/doj/fbi/is/ncic.htm

I will "see" your 7 billion checks and raise you another billion.

http://www.doj.state.wi.us/DLES/cibm...ationindex.htm

All I know my friend is when I've called in an NCIC check with name and DOB I get a criminal history, not just wants and warrants. If I run prints I get a more accurate crim history.

You can even do NCIC checks with "sounds like" indexes where you're not sure of the name or what not.

All of this talk about background checks and NCIC procedure is well and good, but how do illegal immigrants wind up with jobs that allow them access to allegedly secure areas of airports? Several times in the last few years, numerous illegals have been arrested in Atlanta, Boston, Charlotte, and at Dulles, among other airports. See e.g. http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2006/...rt_Arrests.php (Atlanta); http://www.thebostonchannel.com/news...99/detail.html (Boston);http://www.usatoday.com/news/sept11/...rt-workers.htm (numerous airports); and
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...061401107.html (Dulles).

These repeated failures to weed out people who by definition should not be working in "secure" areas points out the limitations of background checks. This is another gaping hole in the United States facade of aviation security, right up there with lack of screening of commercial cargo transported on airliners. Screen passengers and flight crews, to give Joe Six Pack who flies once every 18 months the impression that TSA secures airports. But the truth is far less rosy.

All I know for sure is if I were to fly without going through security I would no longer be working.

I've always found it kind of comical that the flight deck crew was having to go through the checkpoint procedures. If the captain or the first officer decides the plane is going to crash or fly into a building, that's what's going to happen. Neither needs a gun or explosives to make it happen.

Because they're not real background checks. They run the name, which is probably a real name with a real ID and SSN that is not theirs. Its up to the reviewer (an airport employee) to spot the bad ID, which is probably beyond the scope of their training.