It looks like the next time I go through PHX on my way to SNA, which should be very soon hopefully, I may get scanned by a new fangled dangled device at our airports; Controversial X-ray. [via] Vision
The agency is expected to provide more information about the technology at an official unveiling later this month. For now, the agency will say only that one machine will be up and running at Sky Harbor’s Terminal 4 by Christmas.
My trips through PHX usually start at Terminal 2, then off to Terminal 4, on my way to Orange County.
After arriving at,a gate on the far end of, Terminal 4, a Skycap will push me down the causeway, out through security an onto the Bus loading area. Most of the time I end up waiting here by myself, as the Skycaps do not go between the terminals. From here, I wait about 3-10 minutes for a bus.
This older terminal, in the desert, doesn’t have any real shade the last time I went through in the dead of summer, and it was about 100 degrees F. So after wrangling my stuff into the bus, a quick trip through around the airport brings me to Terminal 4.
I generally have a long walk ahead of me, about 1/4 mile depending on where the bus will drop me off. By the time I get to the US Airways ticket counter, I am usually about ready to collapse. Why in this day of age am I at the ticket counter? Well, SCIF doesn’t buy E-tickets, unless they _have_ too. Once I have my tickets in hand, I get to find another Skycap to push me the next 1/4 mile or longer journey to Security where the only good thing is being pushed through the line of people 120 deep.
I hate going through security.
The first thing I do is unpack my gear. Laptop, Video camera. All this stuff has to go into about 2 bins. Then off with the shoes, and support brace, which goes into a 3rd bin, where my cane is to follow. I can’t wear my low back support brace without somehow seeming suspicious. I then get handed a cheap plastic cane to go through the detector. If I’m lucky I won’t beep, or be Selective Service marked, because then I get the full once over; ( pat down, air jet puffed bomb sniffer, metal detector, or even now some TSA official can possibly see me nude with a special scanner?)
The security agency’s Web site indicates that the technology will be used initially as a secondary screening measure, meaning that only those passengers who first fail the standard screening process will be directed to the X-ray area.
Even then, passengers will have the option of choosing the backscatter or a traditional pat-down search.
I have a choice now;
I can choose to have somewhat naked pictures of me on a television screen, where some TSA person can peep on my junk, using some Backscatter X-Ray Technology.
Or;
I can get a nice painful pat down, which I do alert the TSA agent that I am in pain before starting. My back, legs, arms, and neck are quite sensitive to touch after being packed like a tuna. Only if the TSA person is being nice will I actually be allowed to use a cane to balance myself.
Going home through the airport is just as bad. The bus drops nowhere near the Great Lakes ticket counter, and then I have to wait sitting on the ground, for a Skycap. In Terminal 2 there aren’t benches around to sit down. WTF?
The trip through security is the same as before. Last time thanks to US Air, and a retiring pilot, I was made very very late for my next flight almost becoming stranded. Due to my late arrival I of course now had to be extra screened, which made it the last 2 times in that direction. The other times I guess is because I’m only 1 of maybe 5 passengers on the flight back to FHU.
I can’t win, I hate traveling.
The new X-ray machine will be in Terminal 4, which serves US Airways and Southwest Airlines, and handles nearly 80 percent of the airport’s passenger traffic. The security agency is already testing another anti-terrorism tool there called the Explosive Detection Trace Portal.
That machine, commonly known as a “puffer,” is also designed to screen people for explosives without pat-downs. It works by releasing several puffs of air on the passenger, and then analyzing dislodged particles from the person’s clothing for explosive residue.
[update] Of course to see the demo video you have to be using Windows Media. Thanks, really, I wanted to see it, but I can’t seem to view them with my free operating system. Hey TSA, would it have been that difficult to use an open format?
[tags]travel, pain, air_travel, airports, PHX,privacy, x-ray, backscatter, TSA, skycap, terminal_4, us_airways, great_lakes[/tags]
