Heads need to roll at TSA and Homeland Security. Will it take people actually dying before we get serious again?
“This was almost certainly a dry run, a test,” a senior law enforcement official told ABC News.
The two men flew to Amsterdam on United Airlines Flight 908 from Chicago. CNN reports there were federal air marshals on board the transcontinental flight. At least one of the men is being accused of placing mock bombs in the cargo hold of a different aircraft. “What good [is it] having federal air marshals on the plane if terrorists can get bombs on the plane through incompetent TSA screening?” a retired federal air marshal told Pajamas Media.
It appears al Soofi and al Murisi met up in Chicago for the Amsterdam-bound flight after flying in earlier in the day from Alabama and Tennessee, respectively. Al Soofi began his journey in Birmingham, where he had been picked out for secondary screening after a TSA screener found his baggy clothing to be suspicious. According to law enforcement, the suspicion triggered a baggage search in Alabama and revealed that al Soofi had mock bombs, large knives, and box cutters in his checked baggage — none of which are illegal when placed inside the belly of an airplane. Al Soofi’s mock bombs were made of cell phones and several watches taped to various sized plastic bottles. These are historically the components terrorists use to create improvised explosive devices, or IEDs.
Because al Soofi’s mock bombs did not contain actual explosive material, TSA allowed him to board the plane and fly to Chicago. While defying common sense, carrying mock IEDs does not defy TSA security. Apparently neither does the fact that al Soofi was carrying $7,000 in cash and was destined for Yemen.
But the situation moved from unbelievable to outrageous in Chicago, where al Soofi was able to check his bags on a flight headed first to Dulles International Airport in Washington, D.C., and then on to Dubai and Yemen. But al Soofi did not board the D.C.- Dubai-Yemen flight. Instead, he boarded an entirely different flight, the United Airlines flight to Amsterdam. Did al Soofi originally buy two different tickets, which would have put him in two different places at once? Or did he change one ticket at the last moment? And if he changed his ticket at the last moment — oddly switching his destination to an entirely different continent in the 11th hour — then why weren’t his checked bags taken off a flight headed for the nation’s capital first? Most confounding of all is the fact that the TSA has no follow-up protocols. Why wasn’t the TSA in Chicago notified by the TSA in Alabama that a suspicious passenger named Ahmed Mohamed Nasser al Soofi (who was to headed to Yemen, the State Department’s newest, biggest al-Qaeda concern) was coming through O’Hare with checked bags packed with knives, box cutters, and mock bombs? The TSA’s annual budget costs taxpayers $8 billion dollars a year. What are they spending those dollars on? How many suspicious moves does it take to catch a terror suspect in a federalized airport today?
Clearly, there is considerably more going on with this story than law enforcement officials are currently saying. Very little is known about the second man, Hezem al Murisi, with CBS reporting that he may not be linked to al Soofi at all. Time will reveal more. One thing is clear. Rarely are terror suspects arrested for conducting dry runs, which are notoriously difficult to prove. The story of al Soofi and al Murisi is unique in that they have already been arrested. What else does law enforcement now know? The TSA did not return calls.
We have been repeatedly tested, folks. These guys got caught. How many have not? Treacher reminds us not to profile.
