OAKLAND, Calif. — Oakland International Airport officials broke no rules or laws when they directed a charter plane ferrying military personnel from Iraq to a remote corner of the airfield, a U.S. Transportation Department inquiry found.
The diversion, which airport authorities said was based on security concerns, caused the more than 200 soldiers and marines to spend a two-hour layover Sept. 27 between Iraq and Hawaii on the tarmac rather than inside a passenger terminal.
The incident troubled two influential congressmen and some conservative commentators.
Florida Rep. John Mica, the top Republican on the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, said the incident was “a real slap in the face to our troops,” and asked the Transportation Department’s inspector general to investigate.
In a report released Wednesday, inspector general Calvin L. Scovel III said security was in fact a principal issue in the airport’s decision, which he declined to criticize.
The airport said it did not know what kind of screening the troops had undergone before landing in Oakland. Scovel found there is no coordinated policy between the Defense and Homeland Security departments about whether security screening at military bases “is sufficient to meet the Transportation Security Administration’s standards.”
There is also no policy on whether those screened at a base can enter secure areas at commercial airports.
A TSA official told Scovel’s investigators he agreed with the airport’s decision to bar the troops from the secure terminal because the airport could not confirm whether their base screening had met TSA standards, the report said.
Lee ADDS: Just another way to DIS OUR MILITARY!
March 3rd, 2008 at 1:31 pm
The supposed federal regulators of aviation have failed this country yet again, with their own arrogance, malice, incompetence, and ignorance.
It is an outrageous abomination that Bobby Sturgell and his FAA cannot even bother to coordinate with other federal agencies like the TSA and the USDOT so as to ensure: (A) that those that would harm our country do not even enter, much less be trained at and matriculate from, FAA-certified flight schools; (B) that those that would harm our country cannot in any way gain entry to, much less work for, FAA-certified aircraft repair facilities worldwide which may work on fuel-laden, passenger-filled aircraft bound for the USA, as discussed at the February 29, 2008 Senate Commerce Committee hearing at which Sturgell and USDOT head Mary Peters testified, now available on the Internet; (C) that those that would harm our country be required to spend at least more time than the perfunctory 18 seconds through the TSA cordon at Newark Liberty International Airport as passengers have recently experienced at EWR, as reported by the press this week.
Bobby Sturgell is a harmful and dangerous individual whose malice and incompetence must be summarily rejected by the further outcry of the American people. Bobby Sturgell must be ousted from office as current Acting Head of the FAA. It is abundantly clear that he is ONLY acting – and for that matter, he is a bad actor.
Moreover, Bobby Sturgell is a liar who has already perjured himself repeatedly to save his own proverbial reptilian skin, and to protect solely the interests of the monied aeromercantile complex for which Sturgell regularly shills.
Citizens in Rockland County, NY, as well as citizens in New Jersey, Connecticut, Delaware, and Pennsylvania, and elsewhere, were mouth-agape aghast while watching the evasive and false under oath testimony and answers given by Bobby Sturgell on Thursday, February 7, 2008, to the Senate Commerce Committee. Our citizen group Quiet Rockland has thanked Congress for making the webcast testimony of Bobby Sturgell and the proceedings generally, available to all of us, real time and now archived, through RealPlayer software, on the Senate website.
Bobby Sturgell arrogantly insulted Senators Boxer, McCaskill, and Lautenberg, among all of the rest of us, with his persistent utter refusal to answer the most simple of direct Yes-or-No questions. Sturgell made Watergate conspirators sound like they testified on sodium pentothal by comparison. Senator McCaskill asked the core essential question: Do you think air traffic controller fatigue was a contributing factor[?], to runway incursion mishaps, and the slipperiest of eels, the eel of Sturgell, the Sturg-eel, sought to squirm away in the scripted slime of non answers.
Bobby Sturgell, acting FAA head for three months, testified that he had no prior knowledge of the San Diego aircraft near-miss a few weeks ago?
LIE.
Sturgell testified that he had no prior knowledge of recent Newark, NJ departures flying out in the wrong direction in the past few weeks?
LIE.
The nomination of Bobby Sturgell as proposed FAA Administrator should not be confirmed. Instead, after he first personally apologizes to Senators Boxer, McCaskill, and Lautenberg, Bobby Sturgell should then be INDICTED - for contempt of Congress, for rendering perjured testimony under oath, and for already putting millions of otherwise innocent and unsuspecting Americans directly at risk and in the way of harm. Quiet Rockland has now faxed every Senator on the Commerce Committee, asking them to please refer this matter to the AG, IG, GAO, and a Special Prosecutor, and to please now cook this eel.
John J. Tormey III, Esq.
Only robotic people who are limited to seeing in two-dimensions - that is, with no life or worldview beyond the now-outdated two-party system - would think to criticize New York Senator Schumer for taking a needed stand against terrorism and the FAA ineptitude that continues to allow it in the door. Regardless of anyone’s sheep-like intention to be a good party man (or woman), this latest act of extreme FAA malfeasance, transcends party lines, and desecrates our American flag.
It is an outrageous abomination that Bobby Sturgell and his FAA cannot even bother to coordinate with other federal agencies like the TSA and the USDOT so as: (A) to ensure that those that would harm our country do not even enter, much less be trained at and matriculate from, FAA-certified flight schools; (B) to adequately ensure that those that would harm our country cannot in any way gain entry to, much less work for, FAA-certified aircraft repair facilities worldwide which may work on fuel-laden, passenger-filled aircraft bound for the USA, as discussed at the February 29, 2008 Senate Commerce Committee hearing at which Sturgell and USDOT head Mary Peters testified, now available on the Internet; (C) to make absolutely sure that those that would harm our country be required to spend at least more time than the perfunctory 18 seconds through the TSA cordon at Newark Liberty International Airport as passengers have recently experienced at EWR, as reported by the press this week.
Bobby Sturgell is a harmful and dangerous individual whose malice and incompetence must be summarily rejected by the further outcry of the American people. Bobby Sturgell, worse yet, has now demonstrated himself to be an arrogant threat to OUR national security. Bobby Sturgell MUST be ousted from office as current Acting Head of the FAA. It is abundantly clear that he is ONLY acting; and for that matter, he is a bad actor. An awful one, in fact.
Moreover, Bobby Sturgell is a liar who has already perjured himself repeatedly to save his own proverbial reptilian skin, and to protect solely the interests of the monied aeromercantile complex for which Sturgell regularly shills.
John J. Tormey III, Esq.
“Quiet Rockland”