TSA Snafu Damages Nine Planes at O'Hare Field

Absolutely intolerable. The individual involved should be decertified as a TSO immediately, and AA should take the TSA to federal court to claim every last dime lost plus punitive damages for TSA's gross incompetence/negligence. Yes, TSA (and not just the employee) needs to be held accountable for their mismanagment and poor training practices that allow for incidents like this. IMO, TSA officers are not qualified to be on the flightline anywhere near an aircraft, and certainly not qualified to touch an aircraft in any form or fashon. TSA is putting your life and mine in jeopardy, and there needs to be no less than a congressional investigation into what happened and to put a stop to this nonsense. There must be a place for logic in airport security. Please, stick to screening passengers/cargo and stay off the ramp!
:banghead:
 
The TSA agent, as part of spot inspection of aircraft security, climbed onto the parked aircraft using control sensors mounted on the fuselage as handholds, according to a TSA official in Chicago, Elio Montenegro.

{Just plain idiotic. Climbing on aircraft to see if they are "secure"?}

"Our inspector was following routine procedure for securing the aircraft that were on the tarmac," Montenegro told ABCNews.com.

{Elio Montenegro is flat out lying here. We all know the inspector was NOT following routine procedure.}

The TSA agent was attempting to determine if someone could break into a parked aircraft, according to Montenegro.

{Again, blatantly dishonest, and a CYA. The agent was unable to open the door? Shhhh.... The doors on airliners don't lock, Mr. Montenegro...do you share the inspector's incompetence?}

A TSA agent engaging in the very behavior we hope they would prevent.

We don't need this kind of "security".
 
I can't wait to a TSA guy tries to drop the airstrairs on 727 with his buddy on under the plane...:crazy: I can bet they don't know how to close without a B pump running LOL....

What I find a crime is that if a TSA idiot screws up they get sorry and retraining....We screw up the company and the PIC get fined....nice double standard....:banghead:
 
So a guy who knew nothing about the airplane was supposed to check our procedures. Niiiiiiice. They should certainly send the full bill to the TSA and charge the officer with criminal negligence.

Thank goodness the damage was caught before someone launched and had ADC problems.

What would have happened if the TSA ######bag managed to damage the instruments but it wasn't visible or detected by the crew in the inspection.

And then something happened during the flight.

But, but, but, we were securing the aircraft.

By destroying it?

Yes, in order to secure the aircraft, it was necessary to destroy it.

Unbelievable. I was wrong. I thought that by increasing the pay and increasing the requirements to hold the job, they'd get better people.

Unfortunately, I was wrong.

Yet rampers continue to walk unscreened onto the ramp in many airports. Go TSA. You really can't make any more excuses for these people.

And of course, while passengers are taking off their shoes to put them into x-ray machines that don't detect explosives and being asked to dump liquids because some ######bag saw Die Hard III and thought they could do that on a plane, they're letting cargo go right into the belly of the aircraft unscreened.

I'd say shoot the sons of bitches in the head, but it'd do no good. They've already been lobotomized.

But if you think the US guys are bad, the Canadians are worse.

When the caterers go onto the aircraft to replenish things, they are wanded with a metal detector.

Uh, dumbasses, they could put anything they want inside the cart, which has about a bazillion pounds of aluminum cans and other things, and you don't check that out.

And talk about power tripping.

I sighed when they said they had to go through my bag and asked what the problem was. They said they didn't want to tell me. I said, look, if there's something you're looking for, I can help you find it. That will make things faster.

The beoatch called a supervisor over, and she threatened to have me arrested. And I said, for what? I'm American, but I don't believe that asking to help you find what you're looking for constitutes a violation of Canadian law, does it?

A cop wandered on over and said, what's going on here. I told him, and he said, tell him what you're looking for, let's look at it, and get this over with.

I thanked him, and she started to argue with him until he reminded her who had arrest power and who didn't.

It seems like real law enforcement, regardless of what country they are from, doesn't really hold the "security" screeners in high regard.
 
Cant the FAA slap the TSA around a little? They or an approved airline employee should be the only ones allowed to fiddle with airplanes in order the check for security issues. Im still not convinced the TSA should be considered an authority or a government agency.
 
I just wanted to clarify...

I think this incident proves that the TSA needs an overhaul, and they need to keep the hell away from our airplanes. Should maintenance not have discovered this problem, the first time someone would have noticed is (hopefully) on the takeoff roll. NOT COOL. If I was Captain on one of those airplanes, and had to air return for a failed pitot tube, I'd demand accountability.

My point was, we can complain on a message board until we are blue in the face, but that will accomplish nothing. We need to write our representatives and make them understand just how serious this is from a pilot's perspective. Until then, we just need to try and keep our blood pressure and heartrate down as we deal with the TSA. Nothing will change tomorrow, so like I said, do you want to be right, or happy? Yes, we all want both... but I don't like wasting valuable time and energy arguing about the validity of their procedures with people powerless to do anything. Nor do they have the motivation to do anything.
 
I blame the Federal Government. They keep expanding TSA's authority and reach whereas they really don't know what the hell they're looking at.

What the hell does a guy that probably worked at Subway sandwich then went through a few weeks of training have doing inspecting aircraft anyway? If you don't know what a pitot tube is, you don't have any business on the ramp screwing with crap after hours.

What next, are they going to start taping holes (static ports) on the airplane to make sure the non-flying pilot is doing complete and thorough walkarounds?
Hey Doug here is the question though...What can be done to stop this crap? There was an issue sometime back I read about where a bunch of TSA guys boarded a plane while it sat at a gate (empty) and tried to tell the crew when they came back it was unsecured. With the help of the airport police they found surveillance video that showed the tsa opening the secured door and entering the plane.

These idiots have NO business touching these aircraft!

I am not an airline pilot, but I would guess groups like alpa would know how to fight this stuff. IS alpa trying to doing something about this problem?

Obviously something (other than talking about it on a forum) needs to be done before these idiots kill someone…
 
I blame the Federal Government. They keep expanding TSA's authority and reach whereas they really don't know what the hell they're looking at.

What the hell does a guy that probably worked at Subway sandwich then went through a few weeks of training have doing inspecting aircraft anyway? If you don't know what a pitot tube is, you don't have any business on the ramp screwing with crap after hours.

What next, are they going to start taping holes (static ports) on the airplane to make sure the non-flying pilot is doing complete and thorough walkarounds?

Wonder why the TSA agents do not receive basic ramp training & why have the airlines not pushed for the agents to receive the training?

As for damaging aircraft, rampers have been doing that for years & they are comfortable around aircraft & have training.....
 
Airlines push the TSA? Good one bro!

The TSA is a country within itself. Autonomous, far reaching and largely runs unchecked.

I think they fall under the DHLS which more or less leads me to believe that if you don't fully support the TSA's tactics and methods, you're an America-hating evil-dooer and love terrorists. :)
 
"The brilliant employees used an instrument located just below the cockpit window that is critical to the operation of the onboard computers," one pilot wrote on an American Eagle internet forum. "They decided this instrument, the TAT probe, would be adequate to use as a ladder," the pilot wrote.



TSA= Or "Terminally Stupid ASSES" I wonder how the delay codes will be posted as.
 
Don't rampers usually keep their jobs if they damage an aircraft?

No, they usually don't (at least at the airline I worked for). This is why whenever I saw the TSA on the ramp nosing around our aircraft I would follow and watch them (pretty much get right in their face). I sure wasn't going to let my employees or myself get in trouble for some bonehead thing they did or acusation they made.

The department of homeland security should absolutely pay AMR for the cost of the repairs and the delayed/cancelled flights.
 
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