Xanderland

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My First Experience with the TSA Body Scanner

Aug 04, 2010 09:38PM

The verdict:  What an unbelievable hassle.  

I went to DFW for a flight on Friday, and happened to pick a lane where they had replaced the traditional metal detector with one of the new millimeter wave scanners.  Not having used one before I didn’t really know what to expect.   After putting my carry-on bags and Ziplock® baggie of liquids and shoes on the x-ray machine belt, I stepped into the scanner.  (Yes, into, and not through, like you would walk through a metal detector.) 

There, I was asked if I was wearing a belt.   I was.   I always do.  It’s never a problem.  Apparently, with the body scanners, it is.   So back out of the scanner to put my belt on the x-ray machine belt in the midst of some other poor woman’s carry-on bags and Ziplock® baggie and shoes, and then back into the scanner.  

Next, I got another round of questioning…Did I have a wallet in my pocket?  Yes.  Apparently that’s a problem for this machine too.  So, I gathered from the next set of questions, is money, paper, or anything else that you might carry in your pockets.  Apparently, despite being horrendously expensive, they’re next to useless if you’re not practically naked. 

So, now holding my wallet in my hand above my head, it’s finally time for the machine to scan me. 

Two or three seconds later, it’s done, and I’m finally out of the machine.   I’d already have my shoes back on, and been on my way if I’d just gone though the lane with the bloody metal detector instead.   But wait, we’re not through.  

Now, it’s time for me to stand and wait for a bit.   Apparently, the TSA employees manning the gate (it takes two of them, it seems, rather than the one it takes for a metal detector) have to hear back from whoever it is that is looking at the scan, and that seems to take another few seconds.

Now, they’ve apparently gotten the alarming news that I’m wearing socks, (given that they already made me take off my shoes, I’m not sure why that wasn’t apparent) and they have to give my socks a thorough manual pat-down.  Yes, apparently socks are a problem for this white elephant of a security device as well. 

So, in something around ten-fold the amount of time it would have taken for me to walk though a metal detector and been manually patted down, I’ve basically been subjected to the same treatment save the use of a far more expensive and clearly deeply flawed device. 

The silver lining, if there is one, is that these absurd pieces of garbage are far too expensive to replace every metal detector currently in use at every checkpoint, and I’m confident that they’ll be easy for me to avoid in the future.

Comments

  • Anonymous said:

    I totally agree.  Just one more hassle to deal with when flying.  Jacket off, shoes off, now belts off.  Now I have to take every piece of paper out of my pockets.  OK, I'm half undressed & I'm really not comfor

    It honestly may be easier to go through a pat down.

    • #
    • Aug 05, 2010 04:07AM

  • Wimpie said:

    This is a strip-search, period. It makes no difference that the technology allows it to be done on an industrial scale, it's a violation of privacy that ultimately has, at best, no effect on safety. At worst, it exposes frequent fliers to elevated doses of x-ray radiation which may cause more deaths by cancer than the terrorists could ever kill with an airplane.

    Body-cavities are not revealed, thus making this simply an exercise in power-mongering voyeurism.

    You MUST opt-out of these intrusive searches, and maybe be wanded/patted by a same-sex guard. I Opt'ed Out a few months ago, which gave me the opportunity to officially express my displeasure - the smurf wrote down the reason for my opting-out for their official records (it's a strip-search, I said). I suggest more people do this.

    Plus - do you want your kids showing up to Beavis & Butthead in the back room looking like this:

    www.rupture.co.uk/Terminal%204.html

    THIS IS KIDDIE PORN!

    • #
    • Aug 05, 2010 10:25AM

  • Kristin said:

    I opt out every time and go for the pat down. Each time, I am treated like I'm a royal pain in the butt, met with rolling eyes and big sighs from the TSA staff. My children went through the scanners the other day -- I gave them the option, and they were patted down anyway. Perverts.

    • #
    • Aug 06, 2010 05:20AM

  • Roark said:

    One day I hope to read a "TSA rant" that has helpful and realistic solutions to the perceived problems.

    Yes, I work for TSA.  No, our procedures and equipment is not perfect.  Yes, a lot of our procedures and equipment is ridiculed from the inside (as in TSOs) as well.  But really?  Is this it?  Mocking TSOs (who actually have nothing to do with creation of procedure and protocol, or the purchasing of new equipment) and what you feel to be unnecessary precaution?

    Not to mention you claimed this was your first time going through an ATI (oh how I hate the ATIs, trust me it's worse for us then it is for you).  You honestly don't expect to run into a few minor hitches the first time you do something, ever?  Next time you use one (if you choose to) you'll know about taking your belt off and removing everything from your pockets.

    Sigh.  All that said I don't feel that people shouldn't complain about things they take issue with.  It's perfectly normal and it helps expose possible flaws in our system.  The problem is complaining to the right people and/or presenting solutions for these problems.  Letters to senators, congressmen and women, etc.  Don't read this as an anti-rant, but as a plea to forward your feelings to people who can possibly do something.

    • #
    • Aug 06, 2010 04:27PM

  • Willow said:

    Roark, you can do something, too. I worked for the TSA for 2 years. I came to the conclusion that it wasn't doing much that was worthwhile to protect airline passengers. The rules we followed weren't designed to find weapons; they were merely window dressing. (Someone sets off the puffer, and our response is to give them a pat-down search that doesn't include the (female) *** and groin areas? Which happen to be the places a bomb would most likely be concealed. Are we really interested in finding the bomb or aren't we?)

    In short, it's all a dog-and-pony show. At the airport where I worked, part-timers (5 hour shift) routinely got up to 2 hours of breaks. HUGE waste of taxpayers' money.

    You know what I did? I quit. I refused to be party to the rip-off any longer. Yes, I work harder now, but my conscience is clean and I sleep good at night. Try it, you'll like it.

    • #
    • Aug 08, 2010 05:33PM