ATLANTA_Flight attendants at the nation's busiest airport protested Monday against the relaxing of U.S. security restrictions that once again allow passengers to bring small scissors and screwdrivers aboard planes.

"They have taken our safety and our security one step backwards," Air Tran attendant Susan Cosby said at Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport in Atlanta. "How can these items that once were viewed as potential weapons now be deemed safe?"

In actions expected to be mirrored in air hubs across the United States, about a dozen flight attendants in Atlanta wore placards and pins with an image of scissors and a screwdriver with a red slash mark through them, and they gathered signatures for a petition asking Congress to reinstate the bans.

The Transportation Security Agency lifted the bans Dec. 22, allowing previously forbidden items - such as screwdrivers and pliers smaller than 6 inches (15 cm) and scissors with blades smaller than 4 inches (10 cm) - back on board planes.

TSA spokesman Chris White said the bans were lifted so the agency could refocus attention on explosives, which the agency considers the current top threat to aviation.

Knives of any length still are banned from planes, as are cigarette lighters.

"As a flight attendant, I'd take a lighter over a blade (from scissors) any time," said flight attendant Amy Green of Atlantic Southeast Airlines. "I can hear a lighter. I can't hear a blade."

If an X-ray machine detects a small tool or pair of scissors, TSA officials must perform a hand search of the passenger with those items.