Huge Disappointment As Bomb Dogs Fails Dozens of Tests at 10 Major U.S. Airports

Bomb-sniffing K-9 teams at 10 major U.S. airports have failed tests that check how accurately they can detect explosives, according to an NBC News investigation.
New records obtained by KXAS through a Freedom of Information Act request call into question whether those dog teams are training enough to stay

 sharp and keep bombs out of airports and off planes by screening baggage, cargo and passengers for potential threats.
K-9 teams funded by the Transportation Security Administration have failed annual certification tests at 10 large airports 52 times between Jan. 1, 2013, and June 15, 2015, the most recent detailed numbers TSA provided. Some teams failed to find explosives, while others had too many false alarms that could cause unnecessary airport evacuations.
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Dog teams failed 21 times at Los Angeles International, and 10 times at Dulles International Airport outside Washington, D.C., during the same time period. Teams at Chicago's O'Hare, Reagan National in D.C., JFK in New York, San Diego and Bradley International in Hartford, Connecticut, all failed from one and three times.
At Love Field in Dallas, K-9 teams assigned to protect the airport failed four out of 14 tests with a failure rate of nearly 30 percent over two-and-a-half years. In 48 tests over the same time period, teams at Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport failed five times, or 10 percent of the time.



Massachusetts State Police officer Rob Gallant patrols with his bomb-sniffing dog Chico at Logan International Airport in Boston on July 1. Michael Dwyer / AP file
The nation's busiest airport, Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport, however, had only two failures in 75 tests (3 percent) over the same two-and-a-half year time period. All K-9s managed by the Atlanta Police Department passed while two TSA managed teams failed.
Overall, in the records provided by TSA for 10 major airports, dog teams passed 87 percent of their tests, or 350 out of 402. KXAS asked for more comprehensive national figures from TSA but has not yet received them.
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K-9 teams that fail are pulled out of service and cannot work in airports again until they can pass the test, but experts KXAS spoke with say clusters of failures at some airports raise concerns about how well those teams are being managed.