Airport security is a flight of fancy

UNDER THE MICROSCOPE: I FLEW BACK to Cork from Heathrow last November. The airport had just introduced the new security measure of photographing all passengers. I arrived at Heathrow early and decided to go directly to the boarding area. After the most perfunctory glance at my passport I was directed to a camera operator. I chatted to the cameraman, asking him why they had introduced this procedure. He didn’t know and clearly hadn’t been briefed on how to answer.

My picture was taken and I was directed to the check where you remove your shoes and trouser-belt, empty your pockets of change/keys, etc, remove your jacket and pass your briefcase and all the rest through the X-ray machine.

Then off on a long walk to another checkpoint where we all filed past an operator who stared at a computer screen. Your photograph, taken at the entrance, came up on the screen and he waved you through – except my photograph didn’t come up. “That’s okay,” I said cheerfully, “I have my passport here.” He didn’t want to see my passport. A supervisor politely but firmly told me I would have to retrace my steps and have my picture taken again.

SHE ESCORTED ME back on the long walk to the entrance and asked another camera operator to take my picture again. This operator refused, looking at me like I was pulling a trick. Luckily the chap who had taken my picture before was still there. “You remember me,” I said to him. He did, and they took my picture again. Then, off with my shoes, jacket, trouser-belt again, through the X-ray machine and off to the second check. This time my picture appeared and I was allowed into the departure lounge. Luckily, I had time to spare before my flight. The supervisor told me that passengers who are tight for time regularly miss their flights when the computer hiccupped like it did for me.

I have no idea how this photography added to passenger security and I am sceptical as to the value of most of the other checks we are subjected to in airports nowadays. Although the rigmarole we must endure is most irritating, I had assumed that it must be of some proven value. God knows it is expensive enough – the airport operator BAA spent £20 million (€21.8m) on airport security during 2007. But, according to a paper published in the British Medical Journal (BMJ, December 22nd, 2007) by Eleni Linos, Elizabeth Linos and Graham Colditz, there is no published evidence that any of this annoying airport security makes flying safer. Apparently the powers that be are too busy screening us to study if their security measures are effective.

One reason I am sceptical about the efficacy of airport security is that it treats all passengers as if they were terrorists, even though 99.999 per cent are not. The almost vanishingly tiny population of people who are a problem seem to be investigated with no more intensity than you or me who pose zero threat. It seems to me that airport security should be informed mainly by profiling and intelligence. Israeli security is based entirely on profiling.

THE BMJ ARTICLE found no evidence that making passengers take off their shoes and confiscating small items prevented any incidents. In one year in the US, airport security intercepted more than 13 million prohibited items. Most of these illegal items were cigarette lighters and possibly all of them were just absent-mindedly left in the carry-on luggage and in personal jackets. There is no data as to whether any were intended to further bad ends. As for removing your shoes, the BMJ researchers ask the salient question – “Can you hide anything in your shoes that you cannot hide in your underwear?”And, seriously, how many people would answer “No” to the question “Did you pack these bags yourself?”.

In summary, there seems to be little evidence that the irritating airport security procedures we are subjected to really provide any extra security. The BMJ authors point out that medical screening programmes, eg for cancer, are usually not broadly instituted unless they have been shown to work. Perhaps those medical standards should also apply to airport security.

Given the times we live in, I am prepared to endure inconvenience at the airport in order to ensure my personal safety but I would certainly like to be convinced that the particular inconvenience imposed on me serves a useful purpose.

Finally, did you hear about the statistician who was terrified of flying for fear a bomb might be on board? He came up with a brilliant solution to cure his fear of flying. Every time he boarded an aircraft he carried a bomb in his briefcase. He calculated that the probability of two bombs on the same aircraft was impossibly small.

William Reville is associate professor of biochemistry and public awareness of science officer at UCC – http://understandingscience.ucc.ie