Summary

Securing an air transportation system the size of the United States'--one with hundreds of airports, thousands of aircraft, and tens of thousands of flights daily carrying millions of passengers and pieces of luggage--is a daunting task. Concerns have been raised for many years by GAO and others about the effectiveness of airport screening checkpoints and the persons who operate them. This testimony discusses (1) the causes of screener performance problems in detecting threat objects; (2) the status of efforts being made by the Federal Aviation Administration to address them; and (3) compares the screening practices of five other countries--Belgium, Canada, France, the Netherlands, and the United Kingdom--with those of the United States.

GAO noted that: (1) two important causes for the screeners' performance problems are the rapid turnover among screeners and human factors issues involved in their work; (2) turnover exceeds 100 percent a year at most large airports and at one airport has topped 400 percent, leaving few screeners with much experience at the checkpoints; (3) the main reason for this turnover is the low wages and few benefits screeners receive; (4) the human factors issues have not been addressed sufficiently; (5) FAA has several interrelated initiatives underway to address the causes of the screeners' performance problems, including establishing a screening company certification program and a system for the automated monitoring of screeners' performance, and has established goals for improving performance; (6) however, these initiatives have not been fully implemented and are behind schedule; (7) other countries GAO visited conduct their checkpoint screening differently; (8) these operations include: (a) conducting routine pat-downs of some passengers; (b) requiring screeners to have more extensive qualifications and to meet higher standards; (c) paying screeners more and providing benefits; and (d) placing the responsibility for screening with airports or the government instead of with air carriers; (9) the five countries GAO visited had significantly lower screener turnover and may have better screener performance--one country's screeners detected over twice as many objects in a joint screener testing program it conducted with the FAA; (10) it must be recognized that the screeners' performance problems do not fall solely on FAA's shoulders; (11) the responsibility for certain conditions more appropriately rests with the air carriers and screening companies; (12) nevertheless, FAA does have leadership responsibility for aviation security, and it will be up to the agency to provide the guidance and motivation for improving the performance of screeners; (13) the actions FAA has underway are strong steps in the right direction and, when fully implemented, may provide the needed improvement; (14) it is critical that Congress maintain vigilant oversight of FAA's efforts to ensure that it implements these actions in a timely manner and achieves its performance improvement goals; and (15) if performance improvements are not achieved, FAA and Congress may need to consider other alternatives--such as some of the practices being used by other countries--to improve the screeners' performance.