The TSA Is Improving, Only Failing ~80% Of Tests

No sure what pi.ess me off more. 1 - that a terrorist or a crazy man may get on plane with explosive or loaded gun or 2 - I'm paying all these 9/11 and TSA fees (taxes) that has another useless purpose.
At least Delta could allow these fees to be part of MQM, but no.. It is just wasted money from my pocket

Well at least they're pleasant while they go about not being effective. Oh. Wait...

TSA is a joke, my own personal experiences with them gave me the impression that they cares about showing their authority and power over you rather than focusing on their job to ensure safety compliance of the passengers. I wonder if the TSA employees knows what TSA stands for? Also what are their job scope?

@Endre,
Most of your TSA fee goes to fund things that are completely unrelated to TSA or flying. The TSA didn't even request or need the increase from a few years ago.

@Lucky
I know you can't prove a negative, but how many hijackings, bombings or airside shootings have happened since 9/11? They may not be perfect, but so far the TSA has been good enough.

@Tom - the question is not how many hijackings, bombings etc have occurred, but how many has the TSA prevented by its screening practices? It should not be impossible to estimate that number, but I haven't heard the TSA braying about how successful they are. Which makes me think that it's not their screening that's prevented incidents from occurring, but rather other factors (e.g., intelligence agencies doing a reasonably good job of monitoring groups that are likely to pose these sorts of threats; lack of interest in this sort of thing in light of the fact that driving down a sidewalk full of pedestrians is much easier than building a bomb; etc)

@Tom: I have a bottle of elephant repellant on my desk at work. People ask me about it. I ask them, "Well, have you seen any elephants in the office?" "No." "Well, it's obvious that it's working then, isn't it!" This is the same logic people use to justify the TSA's existence.

The TSA hasn't stopped a single terrorist. BUT that's not what they were created to do.

The TSA's original misson was 'to reassure the flying public.' In that, they're failing miserably. I'm more afraid of the TSA than a possible terrorist incident. Just the idiotic laptop ban shows that the TSA is more of a threat to aviation than terrorists. Lithium battery fires CANNOT be addressed if they're in the cargo hold. BUT they can be addressed in the cabin.

The 3 main security improvements which happened because of 9/11 which will prevent another 9/11-style attack (none have anything to do with TSA):
1) Cockpit doors became hardened
2) The public became aware of the situation and now realizes that sitting passively is the wrong approach.
3) Intelligence agencies and law enforcement have finally started (just barely started) to work together.

Until they get rid of the rent-a-cops and bogus machines, we'll never have true security.

I'd want to know exactly how many tests were conducted that allowed them to arrive at ~80%. I couldn't watch the video with sound on so maybe it was covered there, but I have a feeling the TSA and DHS aren't above conducting, say, 3 tests and only failing two of them and touting that they have only a 66% failure rate. That would be another improvement over their recent 80%.

Better tech will not help.
The people they employ are the problem.
If you really want to have effective airport security then you have to profile

US airport security is a third world experience, pretty much every time with only a few exceptions. Just awful in a modern country.

Rest assured - they manage to find water bottles more than 20% of the time!

Ben,

It is a very bad karma incurred by BBC, Bush, Blair and Cheney, who started all this. People have lost items due to this checking. People have suffered severe discrimination, total embarrassment, tons of stress.

To see these checks failing so badly, it just reminds me when American products failed so badly and then the imports came. This is American technology and American ingenuity, and they are failing.

The passengers get hurt.

I certainly would like to hear a balance argument from the TSA side, how is the TSA helping. It could help us understand better, so when we face all the inconveniences, at least we'd know something positive. Now its all negative and this news just makes it worse.

Thick positively
At least TSA pass rate rise triple within several years effort

I'd suggest that this is an indication that it's mostly security theatre.

The TSA screening is just another “liberty eliminating” measure to keep us in line.