From Glenn Fleishman’s post to the Interesting People mailing list:
I heard the strangely frank head of TSA on NPR this morning–perhaps he forgot he was speaking to the public?–talk quite honestly about what I would describe as “yield management for risk.”
Basically:
* The pilots are now protected, so the plane won’t be weaponized even if many passengers were to die on board.
* Passengers will overwhelm someone armed with relatively minor weapons, even if some passengers die. That’s acceptable risk.
* A lot of stuff on planes can be used as weapons already (he didn’t elaborate).
* The evaluated risk of smaller knives is low in their testing — meaning whatever air marshalls wear for protection will resist punctures from smaller knives.He said the focus is now on explosive detection.
Posted on January 2nd, 2006 by Scott Granneman
Filed under: security