Commercial Aviation Security : Integrating People and Equipment to Improve Threat Detection

An examination of technologies for detecting explosives and weapons.

It offers recommendations to assist decisionmakers as they tackle the critical problem of preventing terrorist attacks against commercial aviation.

It includes details on: security technologies, including methods for detecting bulk and sheet explosives, chemical vapour screening for detecting trace explosives, and magnetic portals for weapons detection; selecting, training, testing, maintaining and reviewing the performance of security screening personnel and, most importantly, integrating human operators into total security systems; and issues in equipment deployment at airports, including the balance between encouraging technology innovation and ensuring the peak performance of deployed equipment.