Originally Posted by
tev9999
I'm also guessing that TSA incompetence never looked at the maintainability of the machines. I can't believe they can't be cleaned and have to be discarded because of "dirty air in airports". How about employing a maintenance technician in place of five TSOs doing pat downs to make sure the machines are up and running, filters cleaned, or whatever needs to be done. More than likely TSA said "That's too hard" and "Ohh! Shiny new backscatter machine - lets go play with that!" instead of trying to really develop the technology.
^^^
Some private sector companies do exactly that on equipment that absolutely can't be down for any length of time. They basically have every common part on hand so as to get the equipment back into production ASAP.