Mercury Air Cargo Will
Provide On-Airport TSA-Certified Cargo Screening
LOS ANGELES, CA--(Marketwire - February
02, 2009) - Los Angeles World Airports (LAWA) announced
today that Mercury Air Cargo, a tenant at Los Angeles International
Airport (LAX), has secured certification from the Transportation
Security Administration (TSA) to be the nation's first Independent
Cargo Screening Facility (ICSF) under new TSA air cargo screening
guidelines that took effect yesterday, February 1, 2009.
Requirements for screening air cargo carried on
wide-body jets has been dramatically strengthened under the
Implementing the 9/11 Commission Recommendations Act of 2007,
which requires the air cargo industry to screen 50 percent of
cargo on wide-body passenger aircraft at a level commensurate
with passenger checked baggage by February 1, 2009, and 100
percent screening by August 1, 2010.
"Screening air cargo has been a gaping hole
in aviation security for decades," said U.S. Congresswoman
Jane Harman (D-CA 36th District), chair of the Homeland Security
Subcommittee on Intelligence & Terrorism Risk Assessment.
"I congratulate Mercury Air Cargo and TSA for their efforts
to improve the safety of countless passengers who fly into and
out of LAX. It's exactly this kind of public-private partnership
that we need to leverage in order to keep Americans safe. U.S.
transportation systems remain an attractive terrorist target,
but these new protections greatly reduce the odds of an attack."
Mercury Air Cargo participated in TSA's voluntary
Certified Cargo Screening Program (CCSP) to certify its 200,000-square-foot,
on-airport air cargo handling facility on Avion Drive as an
ICSF. Mercury has secured screening equipment as well as trained
personnel under the TSA's new guidelines. By utilizing its on-airport
facility, Mercury will be able to accept unscreened cargo from
freight forwarders street side, screen it in a secured environment,
and then transport it anywhere on the airport, keeping all operations
within the airport's security perimeter.
"As one of the world's busiest cargo airports,
LAX needs to be ready to meet these new regulations now and
by 2010, when 100 percent of cargo on passenger jets must be
screened on the piece level," said LAWA Executive Director
Gina Marie Lindsey. "Mercury Air Cargo has given airlines
at LAX a leg-up in meeting the new TSA air cargo screening requirements."
LAX is the nation's busiest origin and destination
airport and ranks eleventh worldwide in tonnage of air cargo
handled. Last year, the airport handled 1.8 million tons of
arriving and departing freight and mail, nearly 75 percent of
the air cargo volume in the five-county Southern California
region. Of this total, 310,137 tons (or 17 percent) were loaded
onto departing passenger flights.
"Mercury is the longest, continually operating
tenant at LAX and with that comes a special understanding of
the needs of this airport community and where we can be of service,"
said Joseph A. Czyzyk, chairman and chief executive officer
of Mercury Air Group, Inc., the parent company of Mercury Air
Cargo, Inc. "By becoming an independent cargo screening
facility, we see a real opportunity to help facilitate cargo
screening and especially help out the small- and medium-sized
forwarders, who may not be able to afford the costs associated
with doing their own in-house screening and/or have the desire
to keep up with all of the TSA requirements."
TSA has focused its rollout of the CCSP program
on 18 major gateway airport markets in the U.S., including LAX,
and is looking to implement a supply-chain-wide solution for
meeting the new requirements.
"ICSFs play an important part in helping
small- and medium-sized Indirect Air Carriers meet the new requirements.
We are pleased that Mercury Air Cargo agreed to participate
in the Certified Cargo Screening Program and that they are the
first ICSF in the U.S.," said TSA's Air Cargo Division
General Manager Ed Kelly.
