Several government security screeners at LaGuardia Airport said that moments before they took a certification test to operate machines that detect bombs in luggage, instructors told them answers to all or most of the questions.
Four screeners described nearly identical incidents from classes last month: An instructor taught material for several hours, then read and answered a series of 25 multiple-choice questions that were on an exam given to them.
“He read the questions right out of the test, word for word, answer for answer,” said one screener, adding that the 25 people in his class wrote down the correct answers on note paper and copied them onto their tests with the instructor out of the room.
A second screener, from another class in mid-December, said the instructor stayed in the room during the test but that the exam questions “were the same questions he asked orally just before the test.”
“It was pretty much set up so that you shouldn’t have any way to fail,” said a third screener, who like the others, asked not to be named, fearing retaliation.
“The guy read all 25 questions to you just before he gave the test. To tell you the truth, as he gave the questions, I wrote the answers down, because he read them exactly in order,” the airport worker added.
Passing the tests was required for screeners to become certified using machines that detect explosives in checked luggage. On Dec. 31, a federal law required such inspections for all baggage as part of the heightened security after the Sept. 11 terrorist hijackings.
The screeners’ statements raise questions about the integrity of the training, which the federal government vowed to improve when it took over airport security last year from private businesses accused of cutting corners.
The comments also underscore concerns of federal auditors who said the Dec. 31 deadline may not provide enough time to hire and train screeners.
Mark Hatfield, a spokesman for the Transportation Security Administration, said he found the screeners’ statements “highly suspect.”
“That absolutely would not be done,” he said. “It’s counter to training protocols and training ethics and the nature of the program.”
Hatfield said instructors did give answers before exams to a few questions–“three at most”–that were deemed flawed because there was more than one possible answer or because it concerned material not covered in class.
TSA officials are looking into the screeners’ statements.
At LaGuardia, screeners said agency officials were rushing to train them late last year to operate newly acquired machines.
“They knew they would need us to fill these positions, so we were not allowed to fail. They wanted you to pass,” said a fourth screener.
Boeing Co. oversaw the training and testing under a $508 million contract to train 21,500 baggage screeners in using inspection machines the airplane manufacturer installed at 429 commercial airports nationwide.
Boeing spokesman Eliot Brenner said, “I would consider it unlikely that an instructor would have reviewed every question in advance of the test.”
