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Air Force Liaison/P.Net Original Cast of Characters
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| Sweet Jesus it's getting worse. Great aviation info here: http://www.theaviationnation.com TSA Fast Tracking Screeners to Become Air MarshalsBy Annie Jacobsen CNN's Drew Griffin has been taking the TSA to task. In a report last month, CNN revealed that air marshals are leaving the agency in droves and not being replaced. The result is that 1% of America's flights are protected. This morning, Griffin's follow up piece for CNN is more bad news for the secretive Federal Air Marshal Service. In "Ex-marshal: Air marshal training 'a national disgrace,'" CNN reports that TSA is fast-tracking screeners to become air marshals so as to fill the empty spots. Drew Griffen interviewed air marshals who said screeners with "no college, no law-enforcement no military background" are becoming air marshals. "It's an embarrassment. I know I wouldn't want them on my flight, I wouldn't want them as my partner," one air marshal said. Watch the CNN video here. TSA now admits TSOs are indeed becoming screeners. Ex-marshal: Air marshal training 'a national disgrace' Their mission is to protect airline passengers from acts of terror on U.S. flights. But in a special investigation, former and current air marshals told CNN that the number of marshals assigned to police flights is so low that the federal agency overseeing them has drastically lowered its firearms and psychological testing standards just so it can qualify new hires. More than a dozen current and former marshals told CNN that so many federal air marshals have resigned and are not being replaced that airport screeners are being employed to fill the dwindling ranks. But the Transportation Security Administration, or TSA, says that's not true and the rate of those leaving has remained at 6.5 percent a year since 2001. Sources tell me that air marshals and FFDO pilots are meeting behind closed-door with lawmakers today on Capitol Hill. It's time for full-fledged hearings on TSA and the Federal Air Marshal Service, they say. Scary article here: http://www.cnn.com/2008/US/04/16/griffin.marshal.training/index.html?iref=mpstoryview
LOAD CLEAR! LOAD CLEAR! To avoid criticism do nothing, say nothing, be nothing. Elbert Hubbard
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Seasoned Vet
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Having gone through a majority of the process to be hired by TSA, only held up by a medical issue (had an ear infection that hurt my hearing) I have to only hope that the process is more intense for Air Marshalls than TSO's in hiring. I can not divulge what I had to do, but it was to be blunt, simple. If you have a half functioning brain cell, and do not have a criminal record you should be hired.
If they are bringing in FAM's from the TSO ranks, I would hope they are meeting stricter requirements... I have to admit, I knew they were doing this months ago when going through the hiring process. It was pointed out to me by my interviewer. That the job of Screener could be a stepping stone to the other agencies, especially those under HSA and TSA supervision.
I could probably pass the test, and qualify.... but the physical would be a bitch. Which is why I would not do it, I could pass it, but for the same reason I turned down the Fire Dept., I am not going to place others at risk because my arthritis kicks in at the wrong moment.
They have to do better than it appears they are.
Abraham Lincoln (quiet, reserved and selfless): “The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here” -Gettysburg Address
Obama (egotistical): “Now the world will watch and remember what we do here”
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Hard Charger
 
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| I don't want to sound like I'm bashing TSA, but I spent a lot of my college years doing various types of security work, and back in the Pre-TSA days when security screening was done by private companies, it was generally accepted that the airports screeners were at the bottom of the security food chain. They were the least paid, the least trained, and least vetted and least respected type of security out there, at least in the markets where I worked (Charlotte, NC and Denver, CO.) Seriously, the security guards working at the mall got paid and treated better than the airport security screeners. So along came 9/11 and then the government federalized the airport security people, and what do you think they did? They hired all the barely-literate contract security guards who had been working at the airports. The result was predictible Here's a personal war store: When I flew to Afghanistan in 2003, our little group of about 5 people flew commercial from CO Springs to Atlanta. They opened my bag to screen it and rubbed one of those explosive detector pads on my LBV. Well, we had been at the range so of course it had powder residue on it. It set off their detector and so of course I had to dump my bags out and have everything hand searched.  A soldier, with orders and an ID card, being searched for explosives. Nice use of resources, TSA!
Martin  "When I'm in command, every mission is a suicide mission" - Zapp Branigan, Futurama
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Seasoned Vet
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Martin, I have to agree with you.
I know a couple of folks working for TSA and do believe they are the exception to what you talked about. I have flown about once a month for the last three years, and it is always a pain in the ass going through. I have yet to see anything outright bone headed, but just observing the "employees"....
I applied there to get my butt into the Federal System, and the benefits. Sure was not the pay, because it is still the bottom of the barrell. Guys cutting grass make more money an hour (unless they are illegal that is)... Hours suck, the monotony of the job, and you are not going to attract the best and brightest. I think my interviewer was relieved I could put together more than a 3 word sentance... Like I said the "test" were simplistic to say the least, physical standards... if you can see and hear, and are not in a wheel chair, or high as kite, you pass.
Abraham Lincoln (quiet, reserved and selfless): “The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here” -Gettysburg Address
Obama (egotistical): “Now the world will watch and remember what we do here”
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Regular Joe
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I heard the job pays about $80,000 a year. If thats true things have gotta be bad for them not to hold onto people.
De Oppresso Liber
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Air Force Liaison/P.Net Original Cast of Characters
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Pays more than that........
LOAD CLEAR! LOAD CLEAR! To avoid criticism do nothing, say nothing, be nothing. Elbert Hubbard
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Seasoned Vet
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Yeah but I hear the dress code's a bitch...right Al?
Stand in the door!
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Ei Temporis Vita Semper Resumo Sese
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