No WTMD option
 

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TSA is pushing hard to make NOS the only available option. I have heard that from TSO's at many airports.

I know many TSOs don't like doing the patdowns, but even when the WTMD is eliminated, there will still be 'involuntary medical patdowns' - folks who are incapable, for whatever reason, of assuming and holding the position long enough to get a clear NoS scope.

Some of us are capable of using the WTMD (balance issues, palsy, unable to raise and hold arms over the head (John McCain), ostomy bags - when the WTMD isn't an option, we're all going to be subjected to the grope.

And it takes more employees to run the strip-search machines or do gropes. And now that the agency is unionized there's even less incentive to operate efficiently with less employees.

Bolding mine:. And my response would be "fine with me, let's do it"

There will still be patdowns even if they only use NoS. I've had partial pat-downs several times when forced to use the NoS--apparently the small necklace I wear looks suspicious, or my watch band (remember when they insisted everyone remove their watches to use the NoS?!). Even some clothes have resulted in post-NoS patdowns for me--pocket apparently too baggy, for example.

Mind you, I'm pretty good at self-selecting away from the NoS, but at airports where they're only using the NoS and I don't have an extra 20 minutes to kill, I do get stuck with them at times.

During the first half of 2011, there were a few times where I did see that the WTMD was roped off and the NOS was the only option. (BOS and SRQ come to mind.) Lately, now that the NOS has been in regular use for a longer period of time, I think TSA is figuring out that, with the exception of slow times, the best way to run the checkpoint is to keep the WTMD open for overflow when the NOS gets backed up. In other words, use the NOS as the default screening device, but send one or two people through the WTMD when the NOS has a line of a certain number of people (the threshold has been different at every airport). With this method, all but a few people go through the NOS. I think this method is what's in store for us in the near future. The trick to going through the WTMD is all about timing.

I think the current setup up of WTMD/NOS combos are here to stay for the next few years. I think it will be a while before WTMDs are removed and we get double NOS lanes.

I am really curious about MAMOHT's comment. Has the TSA asked airports with body scanners to make that the only option but allowed them to have discretion? Who at a checkpoint makes the decisions for whether to allow the WTMD to remain available as an option?

I wish I knew the answer. I'm 6'4" and I'm never sent through WTMD regardless of the length of the line. I always (almost) ask the TSO why and a mostly it does not come out in a nice way. The answer is usually the same and they tell me that NOS is the primary device now and some told me that WTMD would go away completely soon enough. As much as I do not want that to happen I actually believe it will.

And didn't TSA say that NOS was for "secondary screening only"? True, that was several (hundred) lies ago...

Ditto. "Great, I LOVE the patdowns!'

Mike

I agree. The TSA has carefully crafted the debate to a trade between doing anything they want as long as you can get through the checkpoint "quickly." A lot of people, including some FTers, have bought that spin hook, line, and sinker. The TSA can't go 100% Cancer Box because they know it would choke most checkpoints and make lines agonizingly long. That would make the focus of the anger that the Cancer Boxes are causing long lines. The TSA must keep the lines moving in order to continue to implement all of the draconian measures they have in place (amd more).

+1. Not to mention, NoS is slower than WTMD, so they'll need more stations open to handle the lines (with a corresponding increase in manpower, of course).

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Unfortunately, it is not your choice what to go through. It is "the chooser" that directs the traffic towards one or another device. What they meant was that in you case you could go through WTMD but only to get a pat down and WTMD was simply a way of going around NOS.