USA Today reports:
[A]ccording to a classified report obtained by USA TODAY, . . . [s]creeners at Los Angeles International Airport missed about 75% of simulated explosives and bomb parts that Transportation Security Administration testers hid under their clothes or in carry-on bags at checkpoints, the TSA report shows.
At Chicago O’Hare International Airport, screeners missed about 60% of hidden bomb materials that were packed in everyday carry-ons — including toiletry kits, briefcases and CD players.
San Francisco International Airport screeners, who work for a private company instead of the TSA, missed about 20% of the bombs, the report shows. . . . The recent TSA report says San Francisco screeners face constant covert tests and are “more suspicious.”
USA Today pitches the story as being about the poor security at LAX and O’Hare. I would think the real story is the dramatic gap between the performance of TSA employees and private sector employees: an 80% success rate seems like an enormous improvement over the TSA’s pretty dismal 25% and 40% success rates, at least assuming that the tests were the same.