Batmanuel

It proves that those common items are made of things that the machine was programmed to look for. Maybe future technology will allow for better programming.

He's a heart patient. Nitroglycerin medication comes to mind.


You answered your own question. The percentage of terrorist 9 year olds on American soil is pretty slim. I'm pretty sure that the Israelis wouldn't have ignored him if a similar situation occurred at one of their own checkpoints. If there wasn't risk screening, the boy would have been frisked. Is that what you'd rather have?

Boggie Dog

ETD prove absolutely nothing as far as true threats go. The devices should be removed.

We have a FTer who uses Nitro medicine. Perhaps they could chime in and tell us if they have ever alarmed the ETD for that substance.

No, I did not answer the question. Neither did you and I'm going to guess that TSA can't answer it either.

Pat downs based on the results of ETD should be banned, at least until a reliable device is reprogrammed or built that only alarms on true threats. Medical Nitro, lawn fertilizer residue on shoes, Clear Care contact lens solutions, hand lotions, and such other items are not security threats.

Doing a pat down on some person because another individual alarmed is senseless and the practice should be ended.

TSA is focused on doing the wrong things.

petaluma1

Bob Burns and the Blog have spoken.

http://blog.tsa.gov/2016/08/tsa-myth...-year-old.html

If screening of these two was unremarkable as the blog seems to indicate, why were they escorted to their flight by AA personnel?

Boggie Dog

TSA's piece says,

"There have been some reports that a nine-year-old child with a pacemaker was prevented from flying home because TSA thought his pacemaker was a bomb."

I don't think being prevented from flying was the complaint. TSA once again just tries to muddy the water instead of having an honest discussion of what actually happened.

Loren Pechtel

We are complaining because the procedure makes no sense.

ETD alarm = grope somebody makes no sense at all, yet that's the way it seems to work.

We have run into this once--ETD (contaminated patch, they couldn't get a reaction from anything in it) on my wife's rollaboard. We had already identified it as hers and it contained some clearly feminine things. Yet we were asked who was to get the grope.

Either check the person whose bag it is or check everyone if the ownership isn't clear. Don't check a volunteer, that makes the whole thing worthless.

petaluma1

http://theantimedia.org/agents-terrorize-boy-pacemaker/

Witness Gwenette Bradley:

That's a great way to demean someone and I suspect just like the swarming, it's something taught by TSA as a means of control.

~~

ETA: Perhaps video is needed of this incident, or a copy of TSA's report. The Blog article makes it sound like their transit of the checkpoint took only a brief time whereas mom says it took over an hour.

GUWonder

I've seen people volunteer to be the proverbial fall-guy who takes one for the gipper and allows themselves to be touched in place of another. The TSA accepts this stuff. The clownish nature of the show in the name of security would be less evident if the TSA didn't have this kind of approach. That said, I've seen somewhat akin ridiculousness at some UK and Canadian airport screening checkpoints.

WillCAD

Perfectly plausible sequence of events. In fact, I'd call it at least as plausible as the mother's account.

Also plausible is the idea that when the kid's ETD alarmed, the TSOs involved immediately escalated to a full hand search of all bags and a mandatory pat-down of at least one adult in the party (since the party had only one adult, she was elected).

And most plausible was that the TSOs involved have such poor training regarding the care and proper use of the ETD machine and its associated paraphernalia, and so little understanding of the concepts of residue transfer and cross-contaimination, that nobody ever had the thought to re-test the kid with different TSO with fresh gloves on a different machine to see if they could reproduce the alarm, or if it was a one-time glitch caused by dirty gloves, contaminated swabs, or an out-of-calibration machine.

It really doesn't matter what the rules are, TSA applies them differently to every person depending on how much they like the person and what kind of mood the TSOs are in at the time.

Better programming of the machine will not compensate for poorly-trained incompetent operators who use the machine badly, have no clue what cross-contamination and residue transfer mean, and make no effort to resolve an alarm with minimally invasive means but immediately escalate to invasive, humiliating, and/or abusive methodology. Because they don't know any better, nor do they care at all.

gingersnaps

And yet, TSA, within it published guidelines, could have easily spoken to the mother and child about using the AIT. It is apparent from the mothers facebook post that they are amenable to using the "other machine" instead of the metal detector.

Boggie Dog

I have witnessed a screener taking a swab that was lying on the table where the ETD was located then using that swap to test an item. No idea how long it had been laying on top of the table or how many testing cycles it had been through.

The only 100% way to use a ETD swab would be to remove it from the storage container, test the new swab before use, swab the item, then test for contamination.

Even then the target envelope is too wide to render useful results.

theddo

If your purpose is to have a test with high Sensitivity, the TSA wants high Specificity. False positives doesn't matter.

Boggie Dog

Contaminated testing media certainly matters. Exactly how would a False Positive not matter? Every result indicating contraband requires more time and manpower to resolve. Only TSA would think such doesn't matter!


Don't think this link has been posted here. This article goes into great detail as to what happened at PHX and this family and is a good read.

http://theantimedia.org/agents-terrorize-boy-pacemaker/

Typical TSA attempt to shift focus and change their story.

FliesWay2Much

The ace-in-the-hole this time is that there is an actual non-stakeholder witness who has spoken up in defense of the victims. The TSA can't ignore it or simply just personally attack the victim with any credibility. The best they can hope for is that the election gets all the headlines and this story will go down quietly without the public outrage it deserves.

Boggie Dog

If that airports FSD was on scene and allowed these events to happen then the first step should be the immediate dismissal of that FSD.

Then start working down the Chain of Command and start chopping out dead wood as needed.

theddo

The TSA is charged with being right when they say someone isn't carrying weapons. They do a poor job of that, but that's what they are supposed to do. Their supervisiors thus accordingly accept a higher rate of false positives than false negatives.

If you have opinions on that you should probably contact your senator or congressman. I have a feeling not many would have the position "lets increase the amount of weapons smuggled through the TSA to reduce wait times" wouldn't fare well come election time.

And that's what it boils down to. The TSOs are public employees, if they have more work that means longer wait times for you and doesn't make any difference for them.