On Monday, seven airport security workers were immediately suspended after a man got through security checkpoints at Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport carrying knives, mace and a stun gun.

Subash Gurang was found with two knives at a checkpoint, and after those were confiscated and he was allowed through, a random search of his carry-on luggage revealed he had seven more knives, a can of mace and the stun gun.

Last month, a man boarded a plane in New Orleans and took his seat before remembering he had a loaded gun in his briefcase. It was never detected by airport security. And at Dulles International Airport outside Washington, D.C., a man with a knife was stopped at security, only to return later with it in his shoe. It was not detected the second time.

While these sort of things may happen all the time at airports and are only being made public because of the recent terrorist attacks, the nation is looking to airports right now to step up their security efforts. Aviation bills are currently being debated in Congress, but partisan bickering has thus far held up getting a compromise version passed.

America needs an aviation security bill passed, and it is the responsibility of Congress to get it done as soon as possible to help eliminate the possibilities of more airline disasters. If it’s easy to get nine knives or a loaded gun on board, how hard would it be to get a boxcutter on the plane?

Right now, the debate is over making airport security screeners federal workers. The Senate passed such a bill 100-0 on Oct. 11, but that bill failed to get through the House (218-214). The House’s version, which passed 286-139, puts the government in charge of the training and supervision of airport baggage screeners, but allows the president to decide their federal worker status. Bush has already said he doesn’t think they should be federal workers.

Something needs to be done. Currently airport security is contracted to private companies, which can set their own standards as to who they hire. Last year, the turnover rates of airport security workers was 416 percent.

They have no interest in the importance of their jobs and are basically the equivalent of rent-a-cops.

Protecting the airlines is no longer a job for the lowest common denominator of society. It is now about national security. Sept. 11 changed a lot of things in America, including how the airlines protect its customers. Changes in policy toward the hiring and training of those workers are needed as well.In all other aspects of society, security is a governmental job.

Those opposed to any federal involvement in airline security don’t complain about the Coast Guard, the Immigration and Naturalization Service or our border patrol, all governmental bodies that protect Americans. Airlines are no different. Even within the airports, there is a strong federal presence. The Federal Aviation Administration controls the air traffic controllers, the airplanes and the crew.

The time is now for our nation’s leaders to get a bill passed that will make the airlines safer. It may not eliminate all the instances of mistakes in airports, but it is a step that can only make it safer.

editorialboard: Andrea Hauser, Tim Paluch, Michelle Kann, Zach Calef, Omar Tesdell