Screeners to shift focus from scissors to bombs

WASHINGTON — Airline passengers soon will be allowed to carry small scissors and some sharp tools onto planes, but there will be a trade-off: the prospect of more-thorough pat-downs and other extra security checks.

The changes announced Friday by Transportation Security Administration (TSA) chief Kip Hawley are aimed at catching terrorists carrying explosives, which the agency considers a greater threat than dangerous objects smuggled into an airplane cabin.

Flight attendants and relatives of some Sept. 11, 2001, attack victims strongly oppose the change. "They're just inviting trouble," said Marcus Flagg, a cargo pilot whose parents died in the plane that crashed into the Pentagon.

Airlines and airports generally support the plan, as does the largest pilots union. Hawley said screeners, recently renamed "transportation security officers," spend too much time looking for objects that don't pose much of a risk, slowing security lines.

Since the TSA took over airport screening on Nov. 19, 2002, the agency has confiscated more than 30 million prohibited items from carry-on bags. Hawley said about one-fourth of those were small scissors and tools, which will be taken off the list Dec. 22.

As part of the effort to focus on bombs, Hawley said more than 18,000 screeners have received enhanced explosives-detection training.

Other changes are aimed at making security checks less predictable.

All passengers still will walk through metal detectors and their carry-on bags will go through an X-ray machine. But more will be chosen randomly at checkpoints for secondary screening, though the type of extra check may vary; passengers might be patted down, their shoes may be checked for bombs, their bags may be searched or they may be checked with a wand.

Pat-downs will be more thorough. Now, screeners only check passengers' backs and abdomens. Starting Dec. 22, they'll be checking arms and legs.

Passengers' willingness to confront terrorists, along with post-Sept. 11 security changes such as air marshals, armed pilots and bulletproof cockpit doors, are why the TSA believes bombs are now a bigger threat than objects.

But flight attendants say more needs to be done to make commercial aviation safe. The flight-attendants unions have been lobbying for mandatory self-defense training and screening of cargo. "We are appalled that we are not being listened to by the federal government as they downgrade cabin security standards," said Tommie Hutto-Blake, president of American Airlines' flight-attendants union.

Some members of Congress have expressed concerns about allowing small scissors and other small tools back on airplanes. Rep. Edward Markey, D-Mass., and Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., said they plan to introduce bills that would restore the ban on scissors and tools.

Material from The Washington Post is included in this report.