Screening at Aiports After September 11, 2001

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On September 11, 2001, there were a series of four coordinated attacks against the United States by a known terrorist group, Al-Qaeda, in New York City and Washington, D.C. (Associated Press, 2003). These attacks changed the security of aviation throughout the nation. After 9/11, the image of general aviation (GA) was tarnished because the 9/11 hijackers trained in small GA aircraft in the United States (Elias, 2010). Even though the hijackers trained on GA aircraft the area of aviation that experienced the largest overhaul is screening at public airports. Many experts say that since general aviation airports vary intensely in characteristics it would be difficult to implement intense security to all of these airports because they are all so different (Elias, 2010). The physical security of GA airports and aircraft has been left up to the public, such as aircraft owners, and pilots instead of being regulated by the FAA (Elias, 2010). Authorities are concerned that implementing too strong of security could impose too much on small airport operators, or fail to lessen the risks that GA already imposes. There have been many incidents and accidents that have occurred due to lack of security in GA airports, and experts still believe security does not need increased. This paper will put forward the risks that general aviation operations impose and reasons why there should be stronger security measures implemented by the government to help mitigate these risks.
General Aviation encompasses about 54 % of all civil aviation within the United States.5 There are a variety of different aircraft types, but also may different reasons for each aircraft to be flying. The number of registered GA aircraft in the U.S. is around 220,000, which has ...

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