In Memoriam

Our thoughts and prayers go out to the families and friends who lost loved ones 10 years ago.

May they rest in peace.

We will do what we can to make sure that this never happens again.

Now They Are Willing To Listen!

More than two years after we were given the "Engage" class the TSA is finally asking for our input.

Quite some time ago we posted a piece saying that we are here to help any way that we could. We spoke about how positive feedback and a pragmatic approach would help to make things better.

Our offer went unheeded!

Now, with the TSA under a barrage of assaults they are finally reaching out to the rank and file. They have finally come to realize that they had an unused valuable asset right under their noses.

Is this a little too late? Can this patient be saved?

TSA- The Best Choice of the available options

We all know that it's not perfect, but I would much rather expend energy trying to fix what is wrong at TSA versus trying to fix what is wrong at CAS. I would rather tackle the 800 pound gorilla and go straight to the source of all these security missteps and over reactions. Let's be instrumental pushing for procedural changes within TSA! Let's meet this challenge head on by offering sensible changes and solutions based on our own years of experience. Let's use our method of "Engage" to get things changed. Someone, somewhere should finally see that this is a valuable resource that should be used. We will keep searching until we find that someone!

The problems at TSA are numerous, too numerous to list. But, if we care at all about what we are doing, or what we are suppose to be doing let's fight to make things better. TSA needs to start listening to those in the trenches who want to make things better. Don't let our years of experience count for nothing! We are here to help, use us.

"We think we do a great job with training and scheduling"

"Well, you know, we are trained -- and you talked about it, we're trained at same standard operating procedures. We think we do a great job with scheduling and training. Training is our forte, training and experience. We've been able to keep screeners for a long time. We have 600 of the original 1,000 in San Francisco. We're happy with that. It comes down to training and experience. If you can keep your screeners, you will do well." - Gerry Berry, December 28, 2009


Ok, so must we ask the obvious question here? This quote is from Gerry Berry that he gave with David Asman on the Fox News Channel shortly after the Christmas underwear bomber attempt. Asman's segment that night was about the possible unionization of airport TSOs. We'll leave that subject to the rest of you to decide.


What is most interesting is the apparent illusion that Mr. Berry is under that CAS does not a good, but great job with training and scheduling. And where does he get this number that 600 of the original 1,000 are still there? While we don't have any hard numbers in front of us, that seems not very accurate.


Asman goes on to press him about flexibility and judgment calls, something that was started by TSA with Engage! and Coach! about two years ago. Berry gets backed in to a corner and implies that at CAS there really isn't any of that going on.


Ah yes, folks! I really hope that you haven't forgotten about Engage! This was that program that we all went through for two days (four days if you had to attend Coach!) where it was impressed upon us to use our gut and make judgment calls, all for the betterment of security. We all know, though, that CAS doesn't practice that at all. In fact, it's business as usual and quite the opposite. We get someone like Donnie Filbert, who doesn't know the SOP very well, instating procedures that AREN'T SOP, yet claiming they are. We all know that CAS does not allow for any flexibility at all!


We'll avoid getting into the discussion of SOP in specifics since we can not allow any SSI discussion here. But we all know that flexibility is not part of CAS's vocabulary and Berry is even more out of the loop if he really thinks there is.


You can all read the transcript from the original interview here. Skip to page 4 if you want to get to the Gerry Berry interview.