Unarmed Pilots, Unsafe Skies — Thanks to TSA
Pilots who are licensed firearms instructors have been deemed unfit to carry weapons in the cockpit. Yet the TSA is fast-tracking unqualified screeners to become air marshals.
Last fall, I received a mysterious telephone call from a commercial airline pilot asking to meet me for coffee at an airport hotel. Pilots are prohibited from discussing security issues with members of the press. Before 9/11 most pilots wouldn’t have dreamed of such a thing. But in the years since, a growing number have felt the need to speak out. Many issues involving pilots have fallen into the hands of the Transportation Security Administration (TSA), including the program that allows pilots to fly armed.
I met the pilot for coffee. Let’s call him Captain X. A veteran pilot for a major air carrier, he is licensed to fly DC9s, 727s, Airbus 320s, and 757s. Captain X has logged over 18,000 hours of accident- and incident-free flying time in twenty-one years of service. Presently, he flies thousands of people back and forth across the Pacific Ocean each week.
Captain X faces a conundrum. As a volunteer for the Federal Flight Deck Officer’s (FFDO) program — pilots fly armed for free — the TSA gave him a psyche test and failed him. In other words, according to the TSA, Captain X is psychologically unfit to carry a gun. “At first I thought there was something wrong with me,” Captain X told me over coffee. “Now I think there is something wrong with the way the TSA runs the program.”
What struck me as equally bizarre about Captain X’s predicament is that in addition to being an airline captain, he’s a firearms instructor in his home state. He’s been handling and using guns since he was old enough to hunt. And in order to keep his skills current, he maintains rigorous training with a personal firearms coach who is the number one competitive pistol shooter in the state. Captain X owns guns, he trains people to shoot guns, and his state licenses him to carry a gun. But the TSA says he can’t carry a weapon in a lock box in the cockpit of the aircraft he’s flying on any given day because he’s psychologically unfit to carry that gun.
For over a year, Captain X kept this information private. He found the TSA’s results to be conflicting, confusing, and upsetting. There is no official recourse or review for a pilot who’s failed a TSA psyche test. The pilot can’t even find out why he failed; the agency considers the results of its psychological testing to be classified. I put the word out among my sources to find out what was happening with other pilots regarding this psyche test. Over the next few months, as various pilots reported back to me, I learned that Captain X was far from alone.
Consider pilot Dean Roberts, a former federal agent. For ten years, Roberts flew as an armed agent/pilot for the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA). Roberts failed to pass the TSA’s test. Then there’s pilot Robert Sproc, a former U.S. Air Force captain who held a “Top Secret/Special Compartmented Information clearance.” Sproc was also failed by the TSA.
“Given the vast numbers of pilots found unfit to be FFDOs, [there is] strong anecdotal evidence suggesting a deep, institutional opposition to the FFDO program within the TSA,” says Captain David Mackett, president of the 23,000-member Airline Pilots Security Alliance (APSA). Mackett cited an example of a “nuclear-cleared” military pilot (i.e., someone who flies planes with nukes on board) whom the TSA deemed “unfit to fly armed.”
The pilot’s psyche test is called the Hogan Personality Test and is administered by an Oklahoma-based company called Hogan Assessment Systems. From public records, I learned that the Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) first contract with Hogan was in July 2002. Their five-year contract was worth $5,162,761, or a little over a million dollars a year. In August 2006, Hogan signed a new, four-year contract specifically modified for the TSA. And then, sometime in 2007 — according to the public records — the TSA cancelled the Hogan Assessment Systems contract.
I reached Dr. Robert Hogan, president and co-founder of Hogan Assessment Systems, in his Tulsa office. Articulate, affable, and clearly dedicated to his work — Hogan says he published the first paper using personality to predict police performance back in 1970 — Hogan spent twenty minutes with me, anecdotally explaining why he thinks it’s important to personality test people who will carry weapons in high-risk situations, including in cockpits and inside nuclear facilities.
“Here’s one story,” Dr. Hogan said, “There was this security guard in a nuclear power plant smoking weed. He came out of the bathroom just as something had gone wrong. The supervisor yelled ‘cut the valve!’ so the guard grabbed a pair of [pipe] cutters and literally cut the valve. That’s why we have personality tests.”
I asked Dr. Hogan to speak about subjecting pilots — who are routinely drug-tested, by the way — to the Hogan Test. “There is a distinction between technical talent and emotional maturity. You can fly a plane and be crazy — or at least be a complete hot-head — which is what we find all the time,” Hogan said.
Captain Tracy Price, vice president of the Passenger/Cargo Security Group (PCSG) disagrees. Captain Price lobbies on Capitol Hill on behalf of armed pilots and is an expert on the FFDO program and the Armed Pilots Against Terrorism Act of 2002. “Airline pilots are an incredibly carefully vetted group of professionals,” Price told me. “For decades, we’ve had psyche testing as a requirement of employment. The FAA requires us to visit a physician every six months. Our view is that it is entirely illogical to tell a pilot he is not stable enough to carry a weapon in the form of a gun when at the same time, he has access to the weapon we are all most in fear of after 9/11 — a plane loaded with thousands of pounds of jet fuel.”
In my interview with Dr. Hogan, I asked him to respond to his critics, including me, who might see his logic as flawed. “We have our critics and our detractors,” Dr. Hogan said.
I asked Dr. Hogan if he knew why the TSA cancelled his contract (TSA refused to be interviewed for this story). Hogan said, “They liked what we did. We had all kinds of data saying the quality of airport security was on the rise, and then they just said ‘go away.’”
I asked Dr. Hogan if he had any idea who would be administering the new psyche test to FFDO applicants. What Hogan said next surprised me: “We still have the [TSA's] FFDO and air marshal contract, but it’s small because the numbers of new hires in those programs are significantly lower now.”
If Hogan Assessments still had the TSA’s FFDO and air marshals contract, then what million-dollar-a-year contract did Hogan lose? I asked.
Dr. Hogan explained that the largest portion of his original TSA contract was to psyche test TSA screeners, also called TSOs. “The TSA shut down the TSO psychological testing program,” Hogan explained.
So, who will be screening the screeners? I asked. Hogan told me, “TSA is doing that in-house.”
What this means is that there will be no more outside psyche tests for the TSA employees who are searching your bags for weapons and bombs. And yet these are the same TSA employees who, CNN reported just last week, are being fast-tracked to become air marshals — to carry guns on planes. In the absence of logic, Captain X’s point is well taken. Perhaps there is something wrong with the way in which the TSA administers its programs.
As one air marshal told CNN, “TSA screeners [who] have no college, no law enforcement, no military background,” are being fast-tracked to carry guns on planes. TSA acknowledges that 36 screeners recently became air marshals. Meanwhile, pilots are being turned down.
In this evidence, Captain David Mackett sees a disturbing trend: “Ultimately, there is ample evidence suggesting the TSA is abusing the psychological screening process to unjustly dismiss FFDO candidates.” The TSA bills the American taxpayer approximately $350,000 per air marshal, per year. Armed pilots are volunteers and fly armed for free.
Captain Mackett cited an example from the written part of the psyche test — since changed — that asked: “Would you like to be a fighter pilot?” Considering that many commercial pilots are and have been fighter pilots it’s natural that many would answer that question with a “Yes.” According to Mackett, the TSA concluded that these pilots “had overly aggressive personalities and disqualified them from the program.”
In the absence of logic, Captain X may feel some relief. He’s not the only pilot who has been black-marked by TSA’s illogical, secretive, and draconian FFDO psyche testing rules. But this absence of logic should unnerve the rest of us.
Annie Jacobsen writes about aviation security and homeland security for a variety of newspapers, magazines and blogs. She is the author of the book, Terror in The Skies, Why 9/11 Could Happen Again.
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22 Comments
1. Dark Helmet:” Cut the valve” has more to do with an untrained employee than a personality trait. Idiots.
Apr 25, 2008 - 3:48 am 2. ldd:Why are they not using the long established industry standard psychological testing instruments - PAR?
These tests are well established and have faking good and faking bad scores built in and can point exactly to the problem areas, if there are any.
As far as ‘being’ crazy, and being a ‘hot head’, well if that Dr.H. can’t tell the difference he’s lying or imcompentent.
High achievers are often type A personalities, doesn’t make them ‘hot heads’. Of course any one can lose touch with reality at any time, but that’s why there should be sound checks and monitoring of these key positions.
But a HUGE factor in predicting human behavior is directly related to past behaviors…um I know that, that sounds like Dr. Phil, but it’s true.
As far as that guard smoking weed on the job, well that’s the full fault of the company that hired him and kept him employed, makes them incompetent and therefore responsible.
Like to see all politicians be made to take a full psychological assessment with the results made public before they are elected.
And, would love to see that Dr.H.’s “personality profile” of the two different instruments on him. Bet he wouldn’t have the balls to do so…
Apr 25, 2008 - 6:30 am 3. Tom:“What struck me as equally bizarre about Captain X’s predicament is that in addition to being an airline captain, he’s a firearms instructor in his home state. He’s been handling and using guns since he was old enough to hunt.”
So, because Captain X has a history of handling guns this qualifies him to carry on onboard an aircraft?
Let’s talk then about Captain A. Captain A underwent some of the most rigorous firearms training available anywhere in the world. His training was modeled after the training our own special forces receive. Captain A passed his physiological assessment with flying colors and went on to attended flight training in the United States. During his first solo flight on September 11, 2001 Captain Atta flew his aircraft into the World Trade Center.
Just because someone has a gun does not mean they should be carrying it on an airplane.
Just because someone has a pilot’s license does not mean they should be flying an airplane.
The pilot’s job is to fly the aircraft, armed or not, period. Perhaps the TSA is concerned that some of the ‘Type A’ pilots will start a gunfight at 30,000ft when they should be landing!
I for one want the plane on the ground as quickly as possible if there are problems onboard, not some hotshot pilot trying to show off. Like that genius in Charlotte; prior military, a veteran pilot, passed the physiological and yet still could not handle a gun properly…
FLY THE PLANE!
Apr 25, 2008 - 7:25 am 4. ldd:“FLY THE PLANE!”
Yeah, like the hijackers did on 911?
So anyone licensed to carry a gun is not allowed to do so in any capacity except when…..?
Hm?
“I for one want the plane on the ground as quickly as possible if…”
Not me, as quickly as possible means CRASH and MASS MURDER with a hotheaded jihad at the helm….
Apr 25, 2008 - 7:40 am 5. Paul Gross:This is what you get when you create a bureaucracy. Even if done for the best of reasons. In short order their prime directive mutates from “doing the people’s work”, to ensuring that the agency lasts into perpetuity. It’s why government employees are overwhelmingly Democrats; they buy into the notion that government is the solution to the problem. As Reagan noted, government IS the problem. That is what is ironic about TSA in the first place. The 9/11 hijackers successfully eluded detection from at least 3 government agencies and what was our solution? Create another agency! Only politicians and bureaucrats would find that logical.
Apr 25, 2008 - 7:44 am 6. Smarty:Liberals are poison wherever we let them inhabit, and all too often, we let them inhabit the federal gov’t.
Where is McCarthy when you need him?
Apr 25, 2008 - 8:08 am 7. Smarty:Well gee Tom, you fail to mention that Atta was never in the US military or law enforcement, and HE WAS A MUSLIM!!!!!!!!
We used to have armed pilots all the time. We didn’t used to be a nation is sissies peeing in our panties at the thought that a man with a gun may be near, a good man, probably a vet. But here we are.
Apr 25, 2008 - 8:11 am 8. J.J. Sefton:It’s not that a new agency was created in the wake of 9-11. What the government did was take the unfit-to-be-burger-flippers and made them UNIONIZED unfit-to-be-burger-flippers. The ideal solution is to take retired law enforcement officers, pay them a minimum wage and allow them to fly free and have them man the security check points (woops, profiling!) Oh yeah, and DISSOLVE THE TSA.
Apr 25, 2008 - 1:21 pm 9. Hornet ball:Just wait until they run our health care. Wake up America!
Apr 25, 2008 - 4:53 pm 10. diane:So, because Captain X has a history of handling guns this qualifies him to carry on onboard an aircraft?
it is not that he ought to “be allowed” as much as the point that he is a trained weapons professional and they have disaqualified him to suit their purpose, and now they are gonna fast track unqualified, untested and unevaluated people (some of whom have had their background checks fabricated) and give them a weapon to board an airplane for a 13 hour flight with 550 people on board? trust me, that has “major disaster” written all over it!
Apr 25, 2008 - 7:48 pm 11. tscottme:Can I suggest that the author be careful about disclosing too many details about Captain X, or others like him that comment without attribution. Specifically, metioning which aircraft he is qualified on, the total-time of experience of more than 18,000 hours, in addition to recently failing the TSA psyche test and being a state firearms instructor make it much easier for those wishing to punish Captain X for speaking out to locate him through company records.
I would have suggested mentiing that Captain X has 10-20,000 hours of experience and is qualified on his previous aircraft type and a half-dozen other passenger transport aircraft, and then the details about the TSA test and firearms instructor qualification.
The alternative method of demonstrating Captain X’s bona fides is just as effective but widens tremendously the candidate pool of who might be leaking details to the press. Sometimes by mentioning the real details in specific enough terms it’s easy to ID the whistleblower and make things worse.
How many airlines are going to have a working pilot that is qualified on the aircraft listed, have 18,000 plus hours, not 19,000 plus or 17,000 plus hours of experience, recently failed a TSA test and be a firearms instructor?
Maybe I’m paranoid from years of reading real-life espionage in college, am I paranoid enough? But, the importance of “bowdlerizing” sources and documents to complicate the matter of locating the source is a pet-peeve of mine. Sometimes seemingly unimportant details are exactly what give away the game.
Apr 26, 2008 - 12:07 am 12. Jabba the Tutt:One, I don’t believe the “cut the valve” story. Why would nuke plant people ask a security guard to do anything? Two, why are pipe-cutters lying around for a security guard to pick up? Three, seems to me that pipe-cutters are for cutting pipes, not valves. Four, marijuana is more of a depressant, not stimulant. The guard would be more likely to say “Chill out, dude” than grab pipe-cutters to cut valves. Five, if this story were true, why haven’t we heard of it before?
So, bottom line that story stinks like three day old fish lying in the sun.
Now, the logic that a pilot is too unstable to have a gun, but is stable enough to fly a many ton jet aircraft with hundreds of passengers on board is simply insane. Your Federal Government at work.
Apr 27, 2008 - 6:16 am 13. John Davies:I really can’t imagine:
1. pipe cutters laying around a control room
2. a control room so understaffed that security guards are used for extra hands
3. security guards anywhere other than a gatehouse or on the perimeter of the plant
I’ve been in plenty of coal fired power plants but never in a nuclear plant.
Apr 27, 2008 - 12:43 pm 14. Keif:” The TSA bills the American taxpayer approximately $350,000 per air marshal, per year. Armed pilots are volunteers and fly armed for free.” Why do you need to go any further? This is the real reason.
Apr 28, 2008 - 9:56 pm 15. Undaunted:Annie; as usual… great job. The more layers you peel off this onion, the more it stinks.
Thanks again.
Apr 29, 2008 - 6:54 am 16. FreedomSight » Blog Archive » TSA Unencumbered by the Thought Process:[...] digging into the further follies of the Federal Flight Deck Officer’s program, run by the TSA. Unarmed Pilots, Unsafe Skies — Thanks to TSA. Jacobsen presents good evidence that the TSA has an institutional bias against the FFDO program. [...]
Apr 29, 2008 - 9:46 pm 17. Joe Allen:“Here’s one story,” Dr. Hogan said, “There was this security guard in a nuclear power plant smoking weed. He came out of the bathroom just as something had gone wrong. The supervisor yelled ‘cut the valve!’ so the guard grabbed a pair of [pipe] cutters and literally cut the valve. That’s why we have personality tests.”
Wow, that must have been one hell of a strong security guard. To cut a valve that has thick cast metal, that guard must have been superman. And why would a supervisor in a nuke plant yell for someone to cut a valve and release a lot of pressure or fluid under pressure?
Maybe I’m missing something but this story must have been concocted by someone smoking pot. I just can’t believe this is an excuse for a psych test. But these psychs are out of touch of real life. My credentials are that I work in a chemical manufacturing facility that has its own power plant, so I know what valves look like. And I haven’t seen one that can be cut by a pipe cutter in just seconds.
I suspect the TSA wants another 9/11 so they can make passengers more miserable. Of course if they just singled out the group of animals blowing up airplanes, male muslims, the rest of us could enjoy peace while flying.
But who would want to discriminate against people who are dying to kill us? LOL
Apr 30, 2008 - 2:20 am 18. Don Gwinn:Tom, you missed a couple of important things.
1. Yes, being a competent firearms instructor who deals with tactical use of firearms DOES qualify you to carry a firearm on a plane. An airplane is no different than any other crowded area in terms of carrying, deploying, or using firearms. The fact that you don’t know that suggests that you’re not familiar with the issue.
2. The pilot you smeared was doing what the TSA requires of ALL FFDO pilots when he fired his weapon. He shouldn’t have been doing it–it’s dangerous, unnecessary, and a clear violation of the rules of gun safety–but it was the TSA bureaucracy that decreed that pilots would not be allowed to fly armed unless they inserted the hasp of a padlock through the trigger guards of loaded weapons at the end of each and every flight.
Apr 30, 2008 - 7:19 pm 19. The TSA Follies - Homeland Stupidity:Again, anyone who understands gun safety should refuse to do that, but it’s not much of a defense of the TSA, since it was their requirement.
In effect, you’ve bolstered Mrs. Jacobsen’s point here by citing another example of the TSA’s passive-aggressive policy of sabotaging the FFDO program. There is no legitimate safety reason for their policy on putting padlocks through trigger guards; Ockham’s Razor suggests that the requirement exists for the purpose of making it cumbersome and annoying to carry a handgun as a pilot–with the unintended consequence that they also managed to make it dangerous.
[...] What struck me as equally bizarre about Captain X’s predicament is that in addition to being an airline captain, he’s a firearms instructor in his home state. He’s been handling and using guns since he was old enough to hunt. And in order to keep his skills current, he maintains rigorous training with a personal firearms coach who is the number one competitive pistol shooter in the state. Captain X owns guns, he trains people to shoot guns, and his state licenses him to carry a gun. But the TSA says he can’t carry a weapon in a lock box in the cockpit of the aircraft he’s flying on any given day because he’s psychologically unfit to carry that gun. — Pajamas Media [...]
May 15, 2008 - 5:59 pm 20. The TSA Follies |:[...] What struck me as equally bizarre about Captain X’s predicament is that in addition to being an airline captain, he’s a firearms instructor in his home state. He’s been handling and using guns since he was old enough to hunt. And in order to keep his skills current, he maintains rigorous training with a personal firearms coach who is the number one competitive pistol shooter in the state. Captain X owns guns, he trains people to shoot guns, and his state licenses him to carry a gun. But the TSA says he can’t carry a weapon in a lock box in the cockpit of the aircraft he’s flying on any given day because he’s psychologically unfit to carry that gun. — Pajamas Media [...]
Jul 15, 2008 - 2:24 pm 21. FFDO Program in Peril? Always. » The Aviation Nation:[...] I do know, and have written extensively about, is that the FFDO has always battled extinction because of the TSA — not because of Obama or [...]
Mar 19, 2009 - 3:42 pm 22. Frank:I feel compelled to answer as many of these comments are out of line. The fighter pilot question is not why they were disqualified. Many, if not most, of the applicants answer yes to that question.
First, with any process like this, you have to err on one of two sides. Allowing unqualified participants in to make certain you don’t disqualify those who shouldn’t be a part, or disallowing a few qualified individuals to keep any unqualified out. With this program, for what should be obvious reasons, the err is on the side of safety.
Let me ask you something. You have to trust someone with security information as part of this program. When someone who is disqualified goes straight to the press, you know what that tells us? We made the right choice.
Just because someone can handle a gun does not make them qualified for the program. Allowing someone to become a pilot up to the commercial level and handle an aircraft is not in our hands. Allowing someone to take a firearm on board is.
Many of you have passed judgment on the program from a one page article. Many of you have somehow used this one page article to color many other aspects of reality, such as health care and liberals. That kind of thinking is something not wanted in an officer at any level. The bias and willing to judge with few details. Shoot first, ask questions later.
What you don’t know is the supporters of the program in the Senate and Congress have largely been Democrats. Feel free to investigate how your favorite representative has supported the program and who is currently trying to get rid of it.
Jun 19, 2009 - 3:39 am