LINTHICUM – Delays at Baltimore/Washington International Airport were minimal Friday, as airlines instituted new congressionally mandated security measures for inspecting checked luggage and dealt with large crowds on a holiday weekend.
Airlines were required to have measures in place by Friday to inspect all checked baggage for explosives.
At BWI, many passengers watched as security personnel sent their bags through one of the airport’s four newly installed explosive detection machines.
Other means of checking bags included bomb-sniffing dogs, manual searches or matching each piece of checked luggage to a passenger on board.
Most passengers were pleasantly surprised that lines moved quickly, and approved of the enhanced security.
“This hasn’t been too bad at all today,” said Carol Phillips, 46, of Sunrise, Fla., as she exited the Southwest check-in line. “And I feel safer with all the bags (inspected) now,” Phillips said.
BWI was selected Wednesday by Transportation Secretary Norman Y. Mineta as a laboratory airport where new federal security measures and technologies will be tested and officials trained.
The recently formed Transportation Security Administration hopes BWI will become a “model” for other airports across the country, Mineta said Wednesday, and Gov. Parris Glendening and the airlines have pledged “full support.”
Longer lines formed at the American Airlines check-in counter and the Southwest terminal security checkpoint late yesterday morning, but even these lines were “nothing out of the ordinary,” BWI spokeswoman Amy Knight said.
“Things have been going very smooth. We haven’t noticed any changes at all,” Knight said.
Some passengers, like Rick Green, 44, of Baltimore, were irritated by expectations set by the government and the airlines that delays were inevitable.
“I kept hearing it would take more time to check in, so you better show up early, like two hours,” Green said. “But I’ll take sitting and waiting at the gate over standing in line.”
The Bush administration acknowledged the transition to increased security could be difficult and time-consuming, and asked passengers to be patient.
The airport and many airlines also asked passengers to check in no later than 30 minutes prior to departure and be at their gates ready to board 15 minutes before departure.
Continental Airlines released a customer advisory warning that any passengers not checked in and at their gate by this time would risk having their reservations canceled, seats released and checked baggage removed from the plane.
Airline officials feared this might cause delays due to people leaving gates to eat or buy a newspaper and returning too late to board. But no such incidents were reported as of early evening yesterday, Miller said.
“Passengers are more aware of what they have to do and what not to do,” she said. “We expect they will continue to become even more aware as time goes on.”
Some Democrats in Congress have expressed disapproval with loopholes in the new security measures, most notably the process of bag matching.
Matching passengers to bags is a strategy in which no piece of luggage is loaded onto an originating flight unless the passenger who checked it has boarded. But those bags may avoid inspection for explosives, meaning this method would have no impact on potential suicide bombers.
Passengers who have been matched to their luggage can also later connect to a different plane, and airlines are not required to ensure they board the connecting flight before loading their luggage.
Airlines will be required under a congressional mandate to inspect all checked bags using explosive detection machines by year’s end, as part of the Aviation Transportation Security Act that Bush signed in November.
“We’re off to a great start,” Miller said. “But it’s the first step in a long process.” -30- CNS-1-18-02