More air travelers sign up for PreCheck program

The Government Accountability Office (GAO) has mixed feelings about the current performance of the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) and its screening practices at airports nationwide.

In TSA PreCheck lines, 93 percent of passengers waited less than five minutes. Two new automated security lanes at the Atlanta Airport are aimed at reducing long wait times.

They say security is able to handle about 55,000 passengers a day, but this week they expect to see up to 63,000.

Around 11:15 a.m. a male passenger heading from Boise to Los Angeles International Airport was reportedly carrying a Glock 9mm handgun in his carry-on bag.

TSA said they are exploring better screening technology that can speed lines up by 30%. “If you can prevent problems from happening there, you don’t have problems that cascade throughout the system”.

During a floor speech, Dold also spoke in favor of bipartisan legislation he introduced to help relieve longer wait times by ending a budget provision that diverts one-third of revenues collected from airline passenger fees to offset spending elsewhere in the budget. TSA screeners overwhelmingly missed prohibited items in covert tests carried out by the inspector general’s office, according to a highly critical report by Roth past year.

The Senate’s version, which was approved by of the full committee last month, would grant the TSA $7.7 billion.

Aviation Security: TSA Is Taking Steps to Improve Expedited Screening Effectiveness, but Improvements in.

“We have been fortunate”, Wyatt said. Among his continuing concerns are that not enough is being done to protect against the “insider threat” of an airport worker or other persons who have access to airport restricted areas, he said. Delta will open its ticket counter at 3:30 a.m. and Southwest at 3:15 a.m. Behavior detection officers look for suspicious individuals or activity at airports.