Security Issue At UK Airports!

[Dogma]

This morning, I was being thoroughly searched and belongings X-Rayed by pleasant security staff in Concord House. To my amazement, two people, allegedly from Customs and Excise (though it was hard to tell as they were just in white shirts) breezed through security with the most tertiary of glances at their passes.

Further more, they had a bag each, set off the buzzer and their passes were not "swiped" through the card scanner.

Surely, this is not commensurate with a policy that seeks to ensure that everyone airside has been searched by airport security?
:confused:

Comments from people involved in Airside Operations at major airports, and those with more than one brain cell welcome!:D

[PaperTiger]

Surely there comes a point where somebody has to be trusted ? Quis custodiet ipsos custodes can only be taken so far, otherwise everybody will end up searching everybody else and nobody will be going anywhere.

And didn't I see this same thread a few days ago ?

[Dogma]

ASFKAP - thanks for the post, interesting stuff.

PaperTiger- There are "trusted" people; myself being one who’s judgement is trusted most days with the lives of 300+ people. But, the principal that the system is promulgated on is that everyone, including the security people themselves are searched.

There has to be no exceptions to the rule: Security for all by the year 2004!:O

[Max Angle]

Surely there comes a point where somebody has to be trusted ? Well I am LOCKED into the flightdeck of an airliner behind a bullet proof door and by overpowering one other pilot or waiting till they go to the loo I could repeat Sept. 11th with ease and no one on the aircraft could stop me. I get security screened everytime I go airside. If I am not trusted then why should anybody else be.

[PaperTiger]

Are the screeners screened before they go on duty ? If so then are the screener screeners screened ?

One can construct a scenario where, with the aid of accomplice(s), the security staff themselves could get weapons airside. I don't think you'll ever get to 100%, the question is how much effort and hassle do you put in above 99%.

[Dogma]

P-T , What system is going to be completely water-tight? None, I'd wager.

But,

Obviously, the screeners are checked, can you not grasp the simple principle of "I search you now you search me". It would take a high degree of collusion to breach that basic security principal.

The issue still remains, There are a group of people airside that have not been security checked!

[PaperTiger]

"I search you now you search me"

That's your last line of defence ? Oh well, if it reassures you.
I'd wager the background checks done on HM Customs staff exceeds greatly that done on security screeners. :*

[ChrisVJ]

Those Romans also had a saying (which I can not quote in Latin 'cos I'm only semi educated) "Test not those you trust the most."

I was taught that it meant that one should always check on those one trusted so they were never tempted. Seems like a sound principle in today's times if we are going to have this rigmarole every time we fly.

They don't actually need security at Nashville any terrorist going through there is going to die of the airport food long before he can do any damage.

[Dogma]

P.T- It does make me feel safer.

Background checks, etc. are important but irrelevant when confronting organizations that are prepared to go to any lengths to achieve their sinister objectives.

1 min out of the Customs Officers day to submit to inspection by well trained security personnel. Despite my background being throughly checked by MI5 and MI6, I am checked daily.

P.S Say hi to Terrance and Phillip for me ;)

[springbok449]

What gets me is that we can't even take Leatherman tools or equivalent onboard...

[Charlie32]

Bucking the trend, Security at Newcastle has been reduced in order to increase the profit margin. About 70 redundacies allegedly and pay cuts for the remainder.

If anything was likely to put security at risk, then a demoralised, overworked, underpaid and disgruntlled security service has to be high on the list!

[Vizsla]

I had to go airside at Stansted yesterday....went to Enterprise House, showed passport, given pass.
Drive up to cargo loading area and because my little group could not all fit into a car, seven of us stood in the back of a transit without windows. Stopped at gate....someone looks at passes and said "If you have any cameras you must leave them here"
No search of our bags or the van - we hand in a few cameras on trust that we have no more and cruised onto the field to go and examine an a/c we are interested in.
We could have had explosives & weapons etc. but the interest was only cameras - when I questioned the "security" as to the reason, he said "Its the Airfield Management because they dont want any journalists or TV people embarassing our lack of security"

[flyingdwarf]

PaperTiger (hidden doofus), I don't quite understand how you can defend not security screening people properly.

This whole talk of trust is one that I think is irrelevant. I know that I am 100% trustworthy and would never do anything to intentionally harm an aircraft and its occupants, and I am sure everyone else reading this (at least I hope so!?) feels the same way. Fact is though, you don't know me and I don't know you. Therefore nobody but the person themselves really knows what they are or are not capable of. For these reasons EVERYONE should be screened thoroughly on all occasions. I know I am a lot happier to be checked thoroughly than let through somewhere lightly because of a pass I hold. To me this only says that many more people in a similar position to myself have been given an equally un-thorough check - and these are people who could actually be capable of anything.

I still think we are lucky in the UK though that we are still so much more thorough than the US. I was gob-smacked by the amazing failures in security I witnessed only a couple of months ago whilst visiting. The security checks performed would have been shocking if I had seen them post lockerby, but to see them so recently was unbelievable. Without going into detail it resulted in the bags (hold baggage) of some of my travelling partners being flaged up to be manually searched after being x-rayed. As I watched I saw the bags in question go down the shoot on their way to the aircraft. The man then called my partners up to check their bags but could not find them. He asked his colleagues, they couldn't find them, then they let my companions go (and more importantly the bags) with no thorough investigation. I know there was nothing in these bags as these companions were my relatives (but that isn't always enough is it?!). However nobody else could have known this. And for whatever reason, whether there was something to raise suspision or it was simply a random check, the security, or at least what little of it there was, failed dismally.

Enough carry on, my point is simple. We really need to get on top of this security issue, both in the UK and across the world. Simple fact is, whilst there are loonies out there, and there probably always will be, complacency is not an issue - or do we need to be shown again in very simple terms before we learn.:confused: