About 30 minutes ago (I'm writing this note from the aa lounge) I went through security in lhr. When I went through the detector, a signal sounded, and I had to be patted down and wanded--these showed NO irregularities. I noticed several other pax were being patted and wanded. I think their equipment is giving false positives--anyone else have problems recently?
There were NO special shoe checks (as they did in the past, using special machines) and there were NO passport checks.
[In some US airports if you walk through the detector slightly off center, this can cause an alarm, but in the US they generally just send you back.]
correct about the u.s. it is sop to give the pax a "second chance" (i.e. double check that they "forgot" to take their belt off, cell phone or, loose change or other metallic object out of their pocket). if one still alarms after the second chance, you get a pat down and wanding along with perhaps a crotch grab