Had a passenger who began to have a heart attack at our checkpoint. She had already cleared and was standing at the rear of the checkpoint apparently waiting for a relative when she began to suffer the first signs of an attack. One of my screeners rushed to assist the lady by helping her take her nitro pill and calming her down until the EMTs arrived. I thought that warranted at least a letter of recognition. You'd have thought I proposed to sleep with the FSD's wife.

What I did was summarize the incident in a Witness Statement since it was the only official-looking document I had available. I submitted it thinking that someone in the front office would catch on the idea and then use what I wrote as the basis for a letter or perhaps a TSA coin or other token of appreciation recognizing the screener's deeds. What I got instead was a nasty-gram criticizing my use of the wrong format and not having used the chain of command. (Keep in mind that I showed it to my supervisor and HE submitted it, not I. It's just that he didn't add to it, so it had the appearance of me having submitted it.)

Well, there are very few things that cause me to lose my cool. This one threw me into a good old-fashioned Whiskey-Tango-Foxtrot mode a la Airborne! To make a long story short, I ended up typing the letter on TSA letterhead, got a supervisor to sign it, and it was presented to the screener the very next day. I wasn't exactly rude, but I was very curt and direct in dealing with the front office staff in getting this thing done. (My wife has seen me in this mode only once and says I have scary eyes even if I'm smiling.)

Then, once I managed to get it done, a screening manager told me that this whole thing could backfire since the incident technically occured off of the TSA checkpoint, and the screener may have overstepped her bounds by offering assistance. Since the letter was signed and waiting for delivery, I just kept my mouth shut. I got what I wanted out of the deal, but I couldn't believe the mentality that would consider punishing a screener for helping someone in dire need. It's not like the screener necessarily saved this woman's life, but she managed to calm her down and provide some degree of comfort until the EMTs arrived to do their job. All I was looking for was a pat-on-the-back for this screener doing something above and beyond her normal duties.