In the immediate wake of the failed Christmas Day bombing attempt of a passenger plane nearing its destination in the U.S., the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) last week put L-3 Communications [LLL] on a $164.7 million indefinite delivery, indefinite quantity (ID/IQ) contract to supply the agency with whole body imagers.
The contract action moves L-3 a step closer to getting its first production award to supply ProVision millimeter wave-based systems to TSA, which calls the body scanners Advanced Imaging Technology (AIT). The agency already operates 40 ProVision systems at 19 airports through ongoing pilot demonstrations.
TSA says that the $164.7 million represents the maximum available to L-3 under the contract. TSA hasn’t placed a specific order against the contract.
“This makes L-3 eligible for future bids on delivery orders for imaging technology systems,” an agency spokeswoman tells TR2.
TSA’s current plans call for acquiring 300 body scanners in FY ’10 using a combination of funds from the FY ’09, FY ’10 and Recovery Act appropriations.
Last fall TSA awarded OSI Systems’ [OSIS] Rapiscan division $25 million for 150 single pose AIT systems (TR2, Oct. 14, 2009). Rapiscan will begin delivering its Secure 1000 backscatter-based X-Ray imaging systems this month with deployments expected to be completed sometime this summer, TSA officials told reporters during a Dec. 30 media briefing at the agency’s Transportation Security Integration Facility located at Reagan National Airport near Washington, D.C.
Placing L-3 on the AIT ID/IQ contract follows closely TSA placing the company’s ProVision system on its AIT Qualified Products List (QPL) early last month (TR2, Dec. 9, 2009). Of the 40 ProVision systems currently deployed, 34 are being used in secondary screening applications and six for primary screening. The agency has characterized those deployments as part of an ongoing pilot demonstration although it currently has no plans to remove the systems.
TSA added the ProVision to the QPL after L-3 made enhancements to the systems that are not in the units that have been deployed. One upgrade is additional processing power that allows an individual being scanned to make a single pose inside the portal instead of two as required in the versions currently at U.S. airports. That upgrade increases throughput of individuals through the system.
ProVisions being pilot tested requires a passenger to make a 90 degree turn after the first scan to allow for a second scan in order to obtain complete coverage.
L-3 has also made software enhancements to the ProVision to meet TSA requirements, the agency officials say.
Indeed, the AIT systems fit with TSA’s model of being able to constantly upgrade the technology through software improvements to counter evolving threats and meet new requirements, thereby giving them greater capability without having to constantly replace the machines.
“Software enhancements will continue for the lifespan of the product,” Thomas Ripp, president of L-3’s Security and Detection Systems business, tells TR2. ProVision systems operating at Amsterdam’s Schiphol have an automated threat detection capability, he says. This is a capability that TSA is planning to add at some point, an agency official says.
The ProVision systems TSA is currently operating and may buy under the ID/IQ contract are not equipped with automated threat detection. TSA officials say this
Interest Soars for AIT Systems
It would seem that following the failed Christmas day suicide bomb attack inside Northwest Airlines flight 253, a strong case has been made for wider, and even accelerated, deployments of the whole body imagers both domestically and abroad. President Obama has ordered reviews of the nation’s air travel screening and of its terrorist watch list system.
In Britain, Prime Minister Gordon Brown is quoted in media reports this week as saying the whole body imagers will be introduced into U.K. airports. Currently Britain’s two main airport operators already have limited deployments of Rapiscan’s Secure 1000.
This week a number of senior Homeland Security officials including deputy secretary Jane Holl Lute and policy chief David Heyman left the country on an international outreach effort to meet with leaders from major overseas airports to review security procedures and technology being used to screen passengers on flights bound for the U.S.
At Schiphol Airport, where the alleged bomber Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab passed through a rather conventional screening–that is a walk through metal detector and an X-Ray of his carry-on bags–before boarding the flight 253 to Detroit there are 15 ProVision systems. The airport has only had seven of the systems deployed but said it will now begin operating the others as well. And in Nigeria, where Abdulmutallab began his trip to the U.S., government officials say they plan to purchase and deploy whole body imagers for use at international airports.
There have been a lot of inquiries about technology since Christmas, Ripp says.
“This incident will continue to have legs,” Chad Wolf, a vice president with the government affairs firm Wexler & Walker, tells TR2. “Airports with U.S.-based flights will consider this technology more.”
Not all countries are rushing to deploy the body scanners. German officials were quoted in media reports as saying that the systems still don’t go far enough in protecting the privacy of individuals as they are scanned. Indeed, it is the ability of the AIT systems to see through a person’s clothing to that makes the technology useful and at the same time controversial. TSA has been slow to deploy the systems widely due to the privacy concerns.
TSA’s current long range plan calls for buying 878 of the AIT systems by 2014. The 150 on order from Rapiscan, plus the 40 already purchased from L-3, combined with the 300 planned for purchase during FY ’10, gets the agency more than halfway toward its current goal. Whether the White House review alters that plan remains to be seen.
The systems TSA is buying from Rapiscan and L-3 will be used for primary screening at aviation checkpoints. The scans are voluntary and if a passenger opts out, he or she will be subject to a pat down search and passing through the traditional magnetometer.
Constraints on AIT Systems
A one for one replacement of the more than 2,000 walk through magnetometers at U.S. airports is highly unlikely. For one, the ProVision and Secure 1000 systems take up far more real estate than magnetometers, TSA officials say. The physical footprint of both systems, in particular the Secure 1000, is significantly larger than a walk-through metal detector. The ProVision is much taller than either the metal detector or Secure 1000.
Another reason is cost. The metal detectors cost about $10,000 each whereas the AIT systems are priced between $130,000 and $170,000 each, TSA officials say.
Finally, the passenger throughput of the AIT systems is less than the metal detectors, the agency officials say. However, TSA hasn’t provided metrics comparing the throughput of the AIT systems versus the walk-through metal detectors. The officials add that the AIT systems process a passenger faster than a security screener can conduct a pat-down search.
Which airports receive the AIT systems and how many go into a particular airport will be determined by risk based analysis, a TSA official says.
In addition to Rapiscan and L-3, other companies are angling to get into the AIT market. Britain’s Smiths Detection has a millimeter wave system that is being tested at the DHS Transportation Security Laboratory (TSL) and American Science & Engineering [ASEI] has the SmartCheck backscatter-based AIT system that TSA has previously pilot tested. AS&E has upgraded its system so that individuals only have to make a single pose to obtain a complete scan.
The Underwear Bomb
Days after Abdulmutallab failed to explode his bomb, ABC News showed pictures of the device, which was sown into his underwear. The explosive material, PETN, was shaped to be “anatomically congruent” with his penis. The trigger for the explosive was a syringe filled with chemicals.
TSA doesn’t disclose its requirements or the exact capabilities of the body scanners. However, regarding whether the body scanners could have detected the explosive material worn by Abdulmutallab, agency officials say the technologies are designed to “detect things that are not part of the body.”
Wexler & Walker’s Wolf says that if a similar bomb is “cleverly hidden” in carry-on luggage, it is possible that it may not be detected using the Advanced Technology X-Ray machines that TSA is deploying to the nation’s airports. That’s because the machines can’t detect explosives, at least not currently. Instead, it is up to TSA screeners operating the X-Ray systems to detect anomalies in the images.
Wolf believes that TSA should look again at possible limited deployments of explosive detection systems (EDS)–similar to those machines used to screen checked baggage for explosives–at some checkpoints. TSA has pilot tested these systems at checkpoints but the machines are much larger than the typical X-Ray technology and cost more. The EDS machines automatically alert for explosives.