Fresh off of introducing a new computed tomography (CT)-based explosive detection system (EDS) designed to compete for aviation security checkpoint deployments, Analogic [ALOG] has hired security detection industry veteran Mark Laustra to lead the effort to bring CT to the checkpoint.
Transportation Security Administration (TSA) Chief Peter Neffenger said in June that his agency plans to pilot test a CT-based system at an airport checkpoint. In July TSA said the pilot, expected to take place at Phoenix Sky Harbor airport, would begin later this year although now it looks like it will be 2017 before it begins.
The CT technology is the same as used to screen checked bags at U.S. airports, and would automatically screen carry-on bags for explosives while providing higher resolution displays for operators looking for weapons such as knives and guns that may be hidden in the parcels. The automatic detection capability would also mean that laptops and bottled liquids could be left in carry-on bags.
Analogic’s new ConneCTcheckpoint CT system is still in development and going through environmental testing and certifications and in early November is expected to begin collecting data using baggage to “teach the algorithms what to look for” and should take less than six months to complete, Laustra tells HSR in a telephone interview. The data collection efforts are dependent in part on government resources and the ability to get into government labs for testing, he say, efforts the government is “fast tracking.”
Laustra says that with TSA’s creation of Innovation Lanes to examine new technologies and applications for aviation security, the agency is “very supportive” of Analogic’s and its competitors CT technologies for potential checkpoint use. He says Analogic’s system will likely begin testing in European labs early in 2017.
L-3 Communications [LLL], which makes EDS systems for checked baggage screening, last year introduced a CT-based system for checkpoint baggage screening. The European Union last year qualified L-3’s ClearScan CT system for screening Type D/D+ cabin baggage. Analogic provides the core CT technology for L-3’s checked baggage inspection systems.
Another company, Integrated Defense & Security Solutions (IDSS), has also developed a CT-based scanning system for checkpoint use. IDSS began qualification testing of its Detect 1000 system in 2014.
The U.S. government is working with these companies to help them get to the point where the CT technology can be evaluated in a U.S. airport, Laustra says.
CT at the checkpoint will optimize “detection and passenger throughput,” Laustra says. It will mean leaving laptops and liquids in bags, which means less time spent by passengers divesting items to be screened, and better screening using the automated explosive detection algorithms, he says.
The ConneCT system is also dual energy and provides “crisper” 3D images for the screener, allowing an operator to better see potential non-explosive threats such as guns and other items on the prohibited items list, Laustra says.
Analogic previously introduced a CT-based screening system for carry-on bags called the COBRA. The Transportation Security Administration conducted a pilot test of the COBRA at one time and it was also previously deployed at Amsterdam’s Schiphol Airport. A COBRA system is deployed permanently in London’s Luton Airport.
The ConneCT system has a lower profile and is lighter weight than the COBRA and is “more in line” with the current AT X-Ray systems used to screen carry-on bags at aviation security checkpoints in the U.S., Laustra says. He says the lower profile gives the operators a better line-of-sight to be able to see each other.
As to the timing of potential significant deployments of CT-based systems for checkpoint screening, Laustra says that it will come down getting through all the governments’ evaluations and then deciding that passengers can keep laptops and liquids in a bag. Once this happens, he says, “there will be a race to get these products first. If you can keep your laptops and liquids in bag in one airport, another hub airport is going to want the same thing.”