March 20, 2023
March 6, 2023
February 20, 2023
February 6, 2023
The tragic shooting of a TSA officer at LAX just exposes another hole in the security measures for airport areas outside of the security perimeter. But can anything realistically be done to prevent another situation from happening?
The TSA was created after the 9/11 attacks on airliners. Their primary job is to prevent guns and other weapons from being taken on planes. With this shooting, officials and lawmakers are exploring ways to prevent a similar incident from happening again. One idea being taken into consideration would be the arming of TSA officers at the airports.
It may be an unavoidable risk however. It is a fact that some jobs entail a greater risk to individuals than others. Increased security could push the debates on what restrictions Americans would be willing to accept for greater security. This is already a sore subject with many Americans. We as Americans have an open society. Malls, stadiums, and airports outside of the security checkpoints just to name a few places.
It would be a stretch to screen 50,000+ people going into a stadium for weapons. It would also be prohibitively expensive. Multiply that by the number of stadiums and malls, and airports where thousands and even millions of people pass through in a year’s time. Protecting those people and protecting the protectors would be an almost impossible task, even if it could be paid for. It does not even take into consideration the additional restrictions that would be required for such a system to even be put in place.
The TSA and Homeland Security have promised to look into airport security to see if anything can reasonably be done to improve the situation. But things being what they are, it is unlikely that any reasonable resolution for additional security would be able to be implemented.
