Next from TSA?: Hat Carnivals?
 

Hats, turbans part of new extra screening at airports

WASHINGTON - Was it the monkey smuggled under a man's hat on a flight into LaGuardia Airport earlier this month? Or does the new hat screening policy reflect concerns that terrorists will find novel means to bring explosives onto airliners?

The Transportation Security Administration won't say.

But an Aug. 4 directive advising the nation's 43,000 airport screeners to scrutinize anyone wearing a head covering that might hide explosives -- be it a turban, baseball cap or beret -- is prompting bitter denunciations by Sikhs and Muslims, whose head coverings are part of their religious observance.

"We have complaints from our community that the way it's being conveyed on the ground is a mandatory pat-down [of turbans]," said Neha Singh of the Sikh Coalition, the nation's largest Sikh civil rights organization. "People who travel all the time tell us that they're stopped every time."

A Transportation Security Administration spokeswoman denied that turban pat-downs are mandatory, or that the agency is engaging in religious or ethnic profiling. "This is not a profiling issue, and in fact we have multiple measures in place to make sure profiling does not occur," said the spokeswoman, Amy Kudwa.

She said that the revised procedures urge screeners to be vigilant about any attire that might hide an improvised explosive device. She declined to be specific for security reasons. But sources who have seen the instructions say they mention several types of hats and dress as potentially suspicious, among them turbans, cowboy hats, long stocking caps and habits.

Kudwa also downplayed any connection between the new focus and the monkey smuggling incident, which occurred on a Spirit Airlines flight from Lima, Peru. "We make adjustments to our screening procedures all the time," she said.
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Security Screening of Head Coverings

On August 4, 2007, TSA implemented revisions to its screening procedures for head coverings. TSA does not conduct ethnic or religious profiling, and employs multiple checks and balances to ensure profiling does not happen.

All members of the traveling public are permitted to wear head coverings (whether religious or not) through the security checkpoints. The new standard procedures subject all persons wearing head coverings to the possibility of additional security screening, which may include a pat-down search of the head covering.

Individuals may be referred for additional screening if the security officer cannot reasonably determine that the head area is free of a detectable threat item. If the issue cannot be resolved through a pat-down search, the individual will be offered the opportunity to remove the head covering in a private screening area.

TSA's security procedures, including the procedures for screening head coverings, are designed to ensure the security of the traveling public. These procedures are part of TSA's multi-layered approach to security screening

This could be anything from a loose fitting shirt to baggy pants. How about just employing the puffers at all airports and actually use them?

There you go with common sense suggestions again. :rolleyes:

Why bother investing in equipment that actually detects explosives, when you can employee thousands of people to harass people, sniff their shoes, pat down their heads, and miss up to 90% of the bombs that test crews smuggle though???

Bingo! That's exactly the reason. If TSA actually had equipment that detected explosives, there might not be a need for Thousands Standing Around.

Is that a monkey in your pants or ...
 

Last week I met a woman who told me about her Cuban friend who smuggled a parrot through customs by putting it in her pants. She drugged the bird to keep it quiet but it started to wake up during the flight. She went to the bathroom and gave it another pill - which knocked it out for a few days - and successfully completed her smuggling operation.

more stupidity from the US Govt...


http://www.mercurynews.com/religion/...nclick_check=1

Sikh men feel targeted at airports
TURBAN `SEARCHES' ANGERS COMMUNITY
By Rebecca Rosen Lum
MediaNews
Article Launched: 08/28/2007 01:39:46 AM PDT



A new Homeland Security Department policy singles out Sikh men for rigorous airport security searches at the discretion of screeners, a national civil rights organization says.

The United Sikh Coalition has written to Homeland Security chief Michael Chertoff to protest the policy, implemented Aug. 4, which it says amounts to racial profiling. Nearly 2,000 have signed petitions.

Previously, travelers wearing turbans were searched only if they failed to clear metal detectors or other preliminary checks. The new rules, implemented Aug. 4, allow pat-downs of religious headgear at the screener's discretion.

For the world's 25 million Sikhs, the turban is an article of faith, only to be removed in the home or in private.

"In the last three weeks, we've heard dozens of complaints, people being asked to remove their turbans in public and denied the use of a mirror or space to re-tie them, said Kavneet Singh, East Bay resident and director of the Sikh American Legal Defense and Education Fund. "For a Sikh man, that's like being strip-searched."

J.P. Singh, president of the Sikh Center of the San Francisco Bay Area in El Sobrante, teaches Department of Justice and local law enforcement agencies about Sikh practices.

"It's like asking a woman to take off her blouse in public," he said. "It's that bad."

Continued...

"What was very strange to us is they are saying it's totally up to the screener," he said. "It's the perception of the screener. And that person could be biased."

Screeners may also search people wearing cowboy hats or straw hats. Skullcaps, worn by many observant Jews, are not on the list of suspicious head coverings, "so it means a specific community is targeted," Kuldip Singh said.

http://www.mercurynews.com/religion/...nclick_check=1

Obviously, she hasn't tried flying while being a brown skinned, middle eastern or hispanic looking, male through GSO lately. :mad:

I know, I know. I keep forgetting that common sense and TSA are opposing poles on a continuum.

Fortunately, the TSA hasn't discovered yet that people have pants pockets.

Mike

Keep telling yourself that, TSA!!!

Or body cavities. Kip needs to be strung up like a pinata and given a couple of good whacks with a stick. What an idiot.

Or shown where those orifices are with a stick.

Hats & headware in general needed to come off previously, right? The TSOs I dealt with sure seemed to think so.

So is this then that the TSA will no longer honor religious customs regarding hats, etc.?

I wear my USMC ballcap all the time when traveling, have never been requested to remove it.

Guess you've been lucky, and I have not. No matter whether it's a ball cap or a fedora, anytime I've tried to go through the WTMD with one on (and a lot of time just when approaching the x-ray to deposit my bins), a TSO has said, "Your hat, too."

Well, to be fair, I can't say this is anything new.

About 12 years or so, I was coming home from my freshman year of college. I picked up this "rice picker" hat as we called it (it was one of those hats you use oriental farmers or Raiden from Mortal Kombat wear) for fun. I tried to wear it thru the WTMD at SLC T2 and the screener took it off my head after I came thru, looked and saw nothing was inside and gave it back. I think that was reasonable then, though he could have at least asked first.

Now that we have better technology, like the puffers, it shouldn't need to be removed. Puffer would pick up explosives and the WTMD would pick up any metal.

Super

True. I recall a ball cap setting off the WTMD at DAB back in... oh, 1998 or so. They must have really had the WTMD sensitivity cranked to alarm on the tiny metal grommets in the cap.

Of course, unlike the TSA often seems to handle that situation today, the screener merely suggested I remove the cap and try again.

:mad: Meanie!!!!

What of the hundreds of poor shoe fetishists who "handle" shoes? They wouldn't be able to practice their love for shoes!



:rolleyes:

Something tells me that if your hat had a pot leaf on it, or arabic writing, that would be a different story.

I regularly wear a baseball or golf cap, and am regularly asked to remove such headgear. And I'm pretty clean cut.

Guess they want to see if I have a bald spot.

Anyone care to guess what EACH puffer costs to purchase and operate per year?

Isn't true security worth spending some money?

Anyone care to guess how effective puffers are compared to screeners?

Puffer that detects explosives: ^

Screener who examines shoes and misses explosives anyway because the x-ray won't find them: :td:

You're right. With all this "anything for security" crap, why not throw resources that will actually DO something to enhance security rather than the kabuki we have now? Realize that it would probably mean a RIF which just doesn't happen in gov't programs ...

DING DING DING!!! We have a winner!!! TSA = Kabuki security + massive workfare program.

If DHS/TSA developed technology to improve security, then fewer screeners would be necessary. Follow the money ...

On a related note, what about the new uniforms?

Who profits and what are their connections?

The answer may surprise you. (Well, maybe not.)

I think whoever came up with that idea should be flogged, personally. That was a complete waste of money when so many other things are broken at that agency.

Then again, they probably had some money sitting in some pot that had to be spent or they wouldn't get that money next year. For that reason alone I saw more plasma screens at the agency I worked at than any where else. Our tax dollars at work. :rolleyes:

I'm talking about feasibility.

I have informal sources that put them at 400k apiece with about a 5% operating cost (20k). If anyone has real info, please chime in.

Same thing in my current Fed position and the military.

Spend it or lose it.

Our policy of fiscal responsibility is a joke.

Hmmm, if that $420k number is correct, my guesstimate is that means each puffer costs about as much as the personnel cost to employ ten screeners (when you add in fringe benefits, training expenses and etc. to the basic payroll cost).

However, the cost of the "puffer" is a one-time expense that could be amortized over multiple years, while the personnel costs of those screeners would be the same (or, more likely, higher) each year.

Some number of screeners will still be needed. But would the short term expense of buying the equipment save money by reducing personnel costs in the long term? Sounds like a ripe subject for analysis by some TSA HQ number cruncher or GAO auditor.

As said above, "If anyone has real info, please chime in."

Doesn't really matter anyway since the TSA has stopped taking delivery on them.

Why?

The payoff checks bounced???

Don't tell me Haliburton has a uniform division???

You are getting warmer.

Perhaps a good FT'er can find an article or other documentation tracing the links of VF Solutions.

If I had solid proof, it would be here.

No you're speaking my language!

"Get over here!"

It's amazing of some of the reactions about the turban searching posted here. The article itself makes the following statements: And explosives can also be hidden in underwear. Is he suggesting searching those now?:rolleyes:

Well seeing how they're already doing pretty much that... asking women with suit tops to remove them....

Given that you're indoors in an airport, it seems silly that anyone would actually wear a hat. With that said, it wouldn't cause me any delay in getting through security, so I really wouldn't care if someone told me to take it off and put it through the machine.

Ok, it's just a hat.....today....but in following the slippery-slope-line of governments, it'll soon be progressing thus:

"Sir, please do take off your hairpiece...you are indoors, so no reason to actually wear a wig."

"Ma'am, I don't care if you've had a breast removed due to cancer, please remove your bra and put it through the X-ray machine...you are in an airport, and not going to seduce anyone anyways."

"All travelers, please bring your own rubber gloves and K-Y for mandatory orifice inspection prior to entering the airport, and kindly bend over and be quiet....after all, we've got to think of the children."

There, I did the hyperbole on the hat-issue :D

Save your keystrokes in responding to thegeneral, Voop. He throws out all kinds of inaccurate statements and then retreats when confronted with the facts.

You may recall he said that the post 9/11 security procedures only add 10 seconds to the time it takes him to transit security.

But it's not just a hat. To members of the Sikh faith, wearing the turban in public has religious significance. Would you find it more understandable if they started requiring observant Jews to remove their yarmulkes? The two situations are comparable.