MIA Eyed As National Model For Tighter Internal Security
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MIAMI (CBSMiami) –U.S Sen. Bill Nelson is in town as Miami International Airport is being eyed as a national example for security.
Miami's airport is reportedly one of only two, including Orlando, in the nation that voluntarily implemented passenger-like screening for employees with access to secure areas.
All employees that have access to the restricted zones walk through metal detectors, their bags go through X-Ray machines and they need to swipe ID badges. Employees also need to enter a PIN to get through certain doors.
Following an incident that happened last December at Atlanta's Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport in which federal agents arrested a baggage handler on charges related to weapons smuggling on passenger flights, extra security has been in the limelight.
"I am going to use this airport as the model for what the other 448 airports in this country ought to be doing because sooner or later you're going to have a repeat of what happened in Atalanta and it's not going to be a good outcome if you could get weapons onto a commercial aircraft," Sen. Nelson said.
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Nelson and other lawmakers on the Senate Commerce Committee, which oversee the country's airline industry, called for a thorough review of internal security procedures at all of the 450 U.S. airports where the Transportation Safety Administration, TSA, is responsible for security.
"Airport security is, and has been, one of our nation's top priorities since 9/11," Nelson stated in a statement. "But even the most well-secured house can be broken into. That's why we must remain incredibly vigilant and work to close any gaps as soon as they are identified."
The request comes amid called from some Senate colleagues for a TSA new law that would subject airport employees, with access to secure areas, to full, passenger-like screenings.
Some say, however, the extra screenings would be too costly.
MIA could serve as a model for other airports as it became the first in the country to implement the employee screenings after a drug-smuggling ring was uncovered in 1999.
Nelson is meeting with TSA and airport officials at MIA to review its internal security procedures with an eye toward possible broadening the practices at other airports across the country.
New security procedures would be voluntary, up to the individual airports for implementation. Congress would have to pass a law to make the rules mandatory.
