The Christmas Day underpants bomber has spurred contractors to create security devices they hope may be deployed in airports across the country, reports the Los Angeles Times today.
Security companies are scrambling to develop devices to sniff for explosives, screen shoes and analyze liquids in bottles. They’re all hoping for a piece of the Transportation Security Administration’s $1 billion in stimulus funding: $700 million to improve baggage screening and $300 million for detection of explosives on passengers.
And it’s not just contractors striving to create new machines. The Homeland Security Department’s science and technology directorate’s New Jersey laboratory tests and develops new technologies that may find their way to your airport, the article reports. Scientists are working on a device that can smell explosives, much like bomb-sniffing dogs.
Said spokesman John Verrico:
There are a lot of things we are looking at that are not ready for prime time. A lot of it may not even work.”
