Attendants question ground security

By Blake Morrison, USA TODAY



Flight attendants are stepping up pressure to close what some call a back door to airport terrorism: ground-crew security.

Nearly seven months after the terrorist hijackings, they say thousands of airport mechanics, caterers and ramp workers still have access to airplanes and runways without passing through metal detectors or undergoing regular searches. The access

continues, they say, despite provisions in the new Aviation and Transportation Security Act that require tighter measures.

The easy access creates "a huge, gaping hole just waiting to be exploited," says the leader of the nation's largest flight attendants union. Pat Friend, president of the Association of Flight Attendants, says she will raise the issue Monday, when she meets with John Magaw, head of the new Transportation Security Administration. Transportation Department spokesman Lenny Alcivar says ground-crew employees "must go through a thorough background and criminal records check as well as pre-screening procedures."

At most airports, however, those workers are not subject to regular searches or asked to pass through metal detectors, as pilots and flight attendants are.

Attendants at Southwest Airlines are so concerned that their union has filed a grievance with the company. It alleges that the airline is "creating unsafe working areas and conditions" by failing to require ground workers to clear security checkpoints.
 
 
A Southwest spokesman says the airline is following security directives and checking its workers' backgrounds. One union leader says that's not enough to stop an employee from bringing a weapon to work. "We know there's disgruntled employees out there, and all it takes is one that's real disgruntled," says Greg Hofer, a Southwest attendant.

In 1987, for instance, an employee who was recently fired used his credentials to bring a gun aboard Pacific Southwest Airlines Flight 1771. The man, David Burke, shot the pilots shortly after takeoff. The jet crashed 175 miles northwest of Los Angeles, killing all 43 aboard.

The transportation security act, passed by Congress after the hijackings, requires workers with access to a "secured area of an airport" to be screened in a manner "that will assure at least the same level of protection as will result from screening of passengers and their baggage. "Those screening measures should be taken "as soon as practicable." Whether background checks and random searches fulfil the provisions of the law is "an open question," says David Schaffer, counsel to the House subcommittee on aviation. He says the law requires "some sort of screening," but it doesn't require ground-crew employees "to go through metal detectors."

Deciding what steps to take won't be easy. Workers often leave and re-enter secured areas. Making them pass through metal detectors or regularly searching them would be burdensome. Moreover, because the layout of each airport is different, developing uniform standards could prove difficult.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2002/04/04/ground-security.htm

April 3, 2002

WASHINGTON, DC - The Association of Flight Attendants, AFL-CIO, has asked the Department of Transportation and the Transportation Security Administration for a consistent rule to ensure that carriers use trained personnel with ample time to conduct aircraft searches for suspicious and dangerous materials. The Federal Aviation Administration mandated the searches after September 11.

AFA International President Patricia Friend made the request in a letter dated March 26 to DOT Secretary Norman Mineta

and TSA Undersecretary John Magaw. AFA has been working with management at several carriers to ensure the searches are done properly. However, some regional airlines have refused to bring in trained personnel or train flight attendants and provide sufficient time to do the searches effectively.

"Flight attendants and passengers on regional airlines deserve the same standard of security provided at the major airlines," said Friend. "It is clear that the DOT must intervene to ensure that these carriers are not allowed to cut corners when it comes to security."

Currently, US Airways Express carriers Piedmont, Allegheny and PSA Airlines and United Express carrier Air Wisconsin are the airlines requiring flight attendants to conduct new security searches in addition to current pre-flight safety checks, without providing any training or additional time. Flight attendants are required by law to conduct pre-flight safety checks of emergency equipment before each flight. Carriers allot the minimum amount of time needed to conduct the emergency equipment checks prior to boarding. These checks were in place prior to September 11.

However, these flight attendants have received no additional training or time to conduct the new exhaustive security searches. And because of the time crunch brought on by the added duties, ground supervisors are pressuring flight attendants * sometimes wielding the threat of discipline * to cut the searches short so passengers can be boarded and an "on-time" departure achieved.

to Latest Additions