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Scanners Coming to Airports Next Month, With Longer Waits
By
John Del Signore
Published Aug 6, 2010
Modified Aug 6, 2010
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By
John Del Signore
Published Aug 6, 2010
Modified Aug 6, 2010
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Got your Flying Pasties? In September the full-body imaging scanners will arrive at last at JFK, La Guardia, and Newark airports. And along with the knowledge that a TSA worker is leering at your naughty bits, you can also expect the security screening process to take even longer. At a meeting with reporters yesterday, a TSA spokeswoman acknowledged that "there could be" longer waits to get through the checkpoints.
Spokeswoman Ann Davis says the actual screening time is five to seven seconds, plus another "brief waiting period" while a TSA official views the scanned image. The whole invasive experience should take 20 seconds, but NJ.com reports that screening times vary wildly, sometimes taking over one minute per passenger, which sure adds up when hundreds are waiting to get through. "It does take a longer time, no question about that," says David Stempler, a spokesperson for a travelers' advocacy group. "They’re a fact of life that passengers have to deal with now, and if it provides a safer system for passengers then we support it."
The scanners use low-level x-rays, which the TSA insists is totally safe. While the dosage meets federal standards by the FDA, some researchers say that the radiation will add up, given Americans' penchant for air travel. "That’s 800 million screenings per year," David J. Brenner, director of the Center for Radiological Research at Columbia University, tells NJ.com "If you multiply that risk by 800 million, then you’ve got a population issue." Brenner and others are calling on the TSA to only use "millimeter wave scanners" used at some airports, which do not expose scanned passengers to radiation.
The TSA has taken pains to allay privacy concerns. The images are viewed by a TSA officer in a locked booth away from the scanner, so that the officer never sees the person being scanned, and the other officer scanning the passenger never sees the scanned image. According to the TSA, the images cannot be saved, printed, uploaded, or transmitted, and are erased when the passenger is cleared.
But the Electronic Privacy Information Center—which was able to obtain more than one hundred images of undressed individuals entering federal courthouses (the feds stored thousands)—is suing homeland security department to stop the use of the technology, which the group calls an invasion of privacy. Underscoring that point, earlier this year a TSA officer allegedly assaulted a co-worker after a test of the scanner "revealed that he has a small penis and co-workers made fun of him on a daily basis."
Tagged
body scans
full-body scanner
jfk airport
laguardia airport
newark airport
John Del Signore
Originally from the Albany area, John Del Signore has called NYC home since 1995. In addition to his thousands of meticulously-crafted bespoke blog posts for Gothamist, his writing has also been published in The Awl, Deadspin, The Nervous Breakdown, and performed at The Brick Theater in Brooklyn.
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Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
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