Originally Posted by
TSORon
As I said, if the alarm cannot be resolved then the passenger cannot be allowed entry to the sterile area. Nor can I comment on what procedures may or may not be used to resolve the alarm.
Believe it or not, completely innocent people occasionally get denied access to the sterile area. It happens. Not every story has a happy ending. Not every drive to the grocery store ends up with a gallon of milk, sometimes it ends in a ride to the hospital, or a tow to the repair shop.
TSA will do everything that is within its authority and power to resolve an alarm, but sometimes that is just not enough. Nothing is perfect, and “what if’s” tend to get repetitive.
I was unaware this was a race. I have “real world” TSO experience, which is what makes my presence here valuable. I have answered the OP’s question to the best of my ability, and several other questions as well. If your wish is to discuss the policies then I suggest we take it to the other part of this forum.
First off, If you knew the procedures that I know (n.b. know) as they were not only explained to me, I asked if I could read it while they performed it on me so I could know what to expect at other airports and I was told yes so if you want to talk about violating the infamous SSI, it's been done (along with a very poor quality discretely taken cell phone pic [hey, I may be old and bald but I'm not stupid
]).
As to the happy ending, yes you're right and imho, that is simply due to the inefficiencies to the TSA and how it does not use its very own resources to the best of their ability because if they did (with this particular subject at hand as well as others, imho, there would be a whole lot less problems as you would get a whole lot more positive outcomes (even if the pax is denied access to the secure area with a honey ("let's see if we can resolve this") vs vinegar ("D-Y-T-W-F-T") approach
As to your "real world" TSO experience, yes you have me and many others with that but.....
How many airports do you work at and how large is your airport? How many have you traveled thru? WIth my 100k plus miles flown each year and with the numerous airports I have transited, I could tell you about procedures that you didn't know existed (and no, I will not name my sources so you're gonna have to trust me on that one but suffice it to say, the person's clearance level is a lot hight than yours)