A Federal Air Marshal sent me this story this morning from blogger Rhona Mahony. It was written last month. It is called Carrying Gunpowder through Airport Security and is based on Mahony's personal experience of carrying gunpowder through airport security in San Francisco. Mahony used a boarding pass she created at home "in a computer art program."

This is a fascinating story. And scary in a number of ways. The fact that Mahony was able to carry components of gunpowder past TSA (components which, she writes, "can be mixed") flies in the face of all the work TSA claims to have done with regards to stopping terrorists from smuggling explosives on board airplanes which they would then mix together in the lavatory. 

There is another scary element to this tale. It is my educated guess that Ms. Mahony will likely be getting a visit from the Feds. They do this. Ask Chris Soghoian.

What remains unclear to me is why Mahony did this in the first place. Was she making a point? Is she a traveling artist? Did she need the components for some other reason? On her blog, Mahony writes, "I used to write articles for The Economist, Ms., environmental magazines, such as E and Outside, and left-wing magazines, such as Z. Before that, I was a lawyer for migrant farmworkers." 

Whatever her motivation, the outcome of this story is clear: airport security is a ticking time bomb.

Here's an excerpt:

Last Thursday, December 5, I brought five ounces (140 grams) of old-fashioned black gunpowder to San Francisco airport. I also brought along a boarding pass for United flight 720 to Denver that I had created at home, in an computer art program. TSA agents accepted the boarding pass. They also took no notice at all of the gunpowder. Accepting the boarding pass was reasonable. Boarding passes that we design and print at home look just like ones designed by the airlines that we print at home. I had thought, though, that I might elicit a short conversation about the gunpowder. Mind you, I had packed the stuff safely. It was in three separate jars: one of charcoal, one of sulphur, and one of saltpetre (potassium nitrate). Each jar was labeled: Charcoal, Sulphur, Saltpetre. I had also thoroughly wet down each powder with tap water. No ignition was possible…

But still. Here's where you might ask, "Hello TSA, is anybody home?" Which is what Mahony does:

Janet Napolitano, Are You There?
Do TSA agents learn in their training that charcoal plus sulphur plus saltpetre make gunpowder? Don’t they watch the classic Star Trek episode (”Arena”) in which Captain Kirk improvises a cannon by finding just the right minerals–guess which ones–to mix up an explosive propellant on that distant rocky planet? Sure, my constituents were packed separately. Constituents, though, can be mixed…

Mahony's conclusion?

And that’s why the TSA agents usually rotely follow the rules of their pantomime, rather than using educated judgment. Educated judgment is too tiring, too expensive, and needed elsewhere

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