As long as people are flying, there will be a need for aviation security. Secure air transportation is an important issue not only domestically, but also internationally. Airlines are seen as national symbols. Airline disasters receive media attention disproportionate to the death toll and, if mass casualties are the goal, an airplane provides hundreds of people at 30,000 feet with no chance of survival. For these reasons, airlines will always be an attractive target for terrorists making aviation security a top priority.
The FAA has done an inadequate job of insuring that the security network which they require to be in place is performing adequately. Moreover, the FAA seems incapable of keeping abreast of the changing security needs of American airlines. Their history has been to guard against the last attack, not stop the next one (Yeffet from Hearings before the Government Activities and Transportation Committee, 1989, p. 17).
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Hougham, C. (2009). Aviation Security in the Face of Tragedy. In: Haberfeld, M., Hassell, A. (eds) A New Understanding of Terrorism. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4419-0115-6_8
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