The Strad reports:

A rare Heinrich Knopf bow belonging to Alban Gerhardt was damaged by security officers as he entered the US. In what the cellist called ‘an act of brutal and careless behaviour’, the bow [...] was snapped in two, over the bridge of the cello, by air security staff at O’Hare International Airport, Chicago, as they examined the case’s contents.

According to Gerhardt, ‘The bow must have somehow moved halfway out of its cover (the tip was still in the cover), and when it was halfway out, [Transportation Security Administration workers] forced the case shut and the bow broke.’ The incident occurred on 6 February, a day before Gerhardt was due to perform Prokofiev’s Symphony–Concerto with the Madison Symphony Orchestra in Madison, Wisconsin.

Gerhardt had also brought a Baroque bow in the case, for a subsequent concert in New York, but for the Prokofiev he was obliged to borrow a bow from Uri Vardi, a cellist and teacher at the University of Wisconsin School of Music.

The TSA broke a baroque bow.

CBS News is reporting about a passenger who’s jewelry was allegedly stolen by a sticky-fingered TSA Officer:

Terri Ivester was on her way to a family christening in Chicago when she ran into a snag at the security checkpoint at Logan Airport.

Terri Ivester says, “The TSA agent holds my backpack up, and um, says there’s a water bottle in this backpack, I’m going to have to take that.”

That’s when Ivester says the agent left the area with her bag.

George Nacara, who is head of the TSA at Logan, tells the I-Team that passengers have the right to stay with their bags.

Needless to say, when the bag was returned, her jewels were gone. And, of course, she didn’t discover it until the trail was cold.

Ivester says she continued through the security checkpoint and she never gave it another thought until she got dressed for the christening.

“I’m ready to put on my jewelry and I can’t find it,” she says.

She realized she was missing four pieces including a single strand of pearls and a double strand bracelet totaling $3,700.

The Boston CBS Affiliate has this story:

The TSA deceptively says that “only” 382 TSA Officers have been fired for stealing from passengers. What they don’t tell you is that they give each one the opportunity to resign before they’re fired. In truth, thousands of TSA officers have lost their jobs because they were caught stealing. And just last year, over 318 TSA agents were arrested for crimes against the travelling public.

Our friends at Lowering The Bar report:

This is an update on a story I mentioned in 2010 (“TSA Detains Possible Terrorist Armed With Flashcards“), and today’s update shows that the government has, if possible, lost IQ points and concern for civil rights over the last two years.

Nicholas George was detained in Philadelphia and interrogated for four hours after sharp-eyed but pinheaded TSA employees decided he was a threat because: (1) his passport shows he’s been to the Middle East sometime in his life and (2) he was carrying flashcards with Arabic words on them (including “bomb”). There are two possible explanations for these facts, of course: (1) he is a student who is studying the Middle East and the language most people speak there, or (2) he is a English-speaking terrorist who is for some reason planning to say “bomb” in Arabic on a plane in the United States.

Now the TSA is claiming it wasn’t his flashcards but the determination by a Behavior Detection Officer that raised suspicion on him!

Let’s hope justice prevails, but I won’t hold my breath.

The TSA gets letters! Stacks and stacks of letters from the flying public complaining about bad treatment.

Through a FOIA request, complaint letters from 2010 have been released. For your reading pleasure, Shiny Badge presents “Letters to the TSA” courtesy of Government Attic (governmentattic.org)

Since the TSA was formed, no terrorists have assaulted airline pilots. But the TSA has. More than once.

You probably remember the TSA officer who scalded a pilot with hot coffee after the pilot told her to stop using the word “nigger.” You would think that TSA Officer would go to jail for the rest of her life, but instead she got off with a very short sentence.

Today, a TSA Officer assaulted a Southwest pilot, grabbing his arm. The (UK) Daily Mail is reporting:

[The pilot] demanded the name of the TSA official, who infuriated the pilot more by refusing to give him his details, it is claimed.

The row then escalated as the [TSA Officer] Mr Harbaugh is alleged to have touched [pilot] Mr Mcghie’s arm, say police. 

It seems that we can ensure the safety of our pilots by eliminating the TSA. The TSA, when they have no iPads to steal from the flying public, gets angry and lashes out at pilots.

In these cases, the TSA generally “loses” the video footage. They only seem to be able to produce it when it advances their cause.

When they’re not stealing your iPads or your cash, TSA employees earn extra income by smuggling drugs.

This week, another TSA Officer, along with Millage Peaks–the son of a former L.A. city fire chief–plead guilty to conspiracy charges related to their drug smuggling operation.

The LA Times is reporting:

Millage Peaks IV, 24, of Los Angeles; Randy Littlefield, 29, of Paramount; and Dianna Perez, 28, of Inglewood, face a maximum of five years in federal prison, prosecutors said.

According to documents filed in federal court Tuesday, Peaks — the son of ex-fire chief Millage Peaks III, who retired last year — initiated the scheme by offering to pay Perez, then a Transportation Security Administration employee, about $500 for passing a bag of marijuana through Los Angeles International Airport security in November 2010.

Perez helped Peaks and two other couriers pass drug-laden bags through airport security nine times in a span of about a year, the plea agreements read. She offered tips on how to pack the marijuana so it wouldn’t trigger alarms, the documents said, and personally “checked” any bags that did trigger alarms before clearing them.[...]Perez and Peaks were arrested in October 2011 after a baggage handler smelled marijuana in the luggage and alerted authorities, who found 14 pounds of marijuana inside.

Perez was fired from her TSA job in October; Littlefield resigned the same month.

Two other men who carried drugs through security — Charles Hicks, 24, of Culver City, and Andrew Welter, 25, of Fontana — have also agreed to plead guilty to one count of conspiracy for their roles in the scheme, according to documents filed in federal district court. They also face up to five years in prison.