Gunpowder and Airport Security

Security expert Bruce Schneier links to this story by a woman who claims to have passed security at the San Francisco airport with a counterfeit boarding pass in her hand and gunpowder in her carry-on luggage.

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. As a good citizen, I had packed the resulting pastes into a quart-sized “3-1-1″ plastic bag, along with my shampoo and hand cream. This bag I took out of my messenger bag and put on top of my bin of belongings, turned so that the labels were easy for the TSA inspector to read.

Is her account true? I have no idea. There is a picture on her blog of her standing in what appears to be an airport security line, holding what appear to be little jars. But this hardly constitutes proof, so a degree of skepticism is warranted. But if her account is true, it would square with other similar stories of TSA security holes (e.g., here, here, here, here).