TSA Says The Person Was Stopped At A Security Checkpoint

TSA says a serviceman was arrested Saturday at an airport in Texas after he tried to bring explosives in military-grade wrapping onto a plane.

NBC Television reports that Trey Atwater was arrested for attempting to carry the explosives through a checkpoint. He was to be arraigned on Tuesday. A TSO spotted the material during an x-ray screening of Atwater's carry-on bags. He and his wife had been visiting family and were returning to Fort Bragg when the incident occurred.

But it wasn't the only contraband confiscated by TSA over the holidays. The agency reports on its blog that items ranging from an artfully concealed non-metallic martial arts weapon called a “Tactical Spike”  found in the sock of a passenger at Pensacola (PNS) after being screened by a body scanner, to  a tree saw with a 13-inch blade, a pocketknife with a 3-inch blade, two throwing knives with 8-inch blades, eleven individual 30-06 rifle rounds, one 12-gauge shotgun slug, five count of buckshot, and five boxes, each containing 25 rounds of 12-gauge shotgun shells at various airports around the country. Some were what TSA calls "Artfully Concealed," meaning that the prohibited item was intentionally concealed with the intention of sneaking it through security. One of those items was a 14" sword cane.

And while the Texas incident involved live explosives, TSA reports that a total of three inert grenades were found in checked baggage at Salt Lake City (SLT) and Tucson (TUS). They were gifts, according to the passengers who had packed them.

TSA says it has 20 layers of security, both visible and invisible to the public, including checkpoint and checked baggage screening. Each one of these layers alone is capable of stopping a terrorist attack. In combination their security value is multiplied, creating a much stronger, formidable system. A terrorist who has to overcome multiple security layers in order to carry out an attack is more likely to be pre-empted, deterred, or to fail during the attempt. (Image provided by TSA)

FMI: www.tsa.gov