LaserSailor

Not in my experience, both past and present.

flitcraft

So, where in the world have you found use routine patdowns including hands through hair, hands inside pants, manual contact with breasts and vulvar areas? I travel internationally probably a dozen times a year to Europe and Asia and have never experienced anything like that except in the US. So, where are you referring to?

Global_Hi_Flyer

Technically in a foreign country, but IST did so for US-bound flights. Virtually every passenger. Overkill.

In the UK, body scanners are mandatory, no opt-out.

But generally not as bad as the US.

chollie

I have never been 'groped' in another country (including IST).

I have had hands 'float' all over my body, but still never up between my legs into contact with my genitals, never in my pants or the neckline of my shirt. No heavy duty clutching/squeezing/palpating/karate chops to my 'resistance'. Often times hands barely skimming my body while holding a wand.

Much of the time (exiting Europe, for example), it was done at the insistence of TSA. Other times (India), it was done even on internal flights.

Always travel with my bags locked (including carry-on). Never had a checked bag searched outside my presence. Never had someone go into my carry-on without me being right there.

I understand there's no opt-out in the UK, but that the numbers of pax forced through the NoS are far lower than in the US.

Edited to add: new thread about a 17-year-old girl who had her breasts exposed during patdown. She was wearing a sundress and the dress got pulled down while her 'stomach area' was being 'patted'.

That's part of my point: when I'm abroad, I'm actually 'patted' (or very lightly skimmed). I have never experienced the groping, firm sliding/rubbing contact I get here in the US. A 'pat' would not have pulled the girl's dress down.

LaserSailor

I have looked down a machine gun barrel in another country.

Our security system needs review, major change, and rationalization but lets get our facts straight so we are taken seriously.

chollie

I would rather look at a machine gun barrel (and we have had National Guard troops at US airports after 9-11, although there were rumors that their weapons were not loaded) than have hands between my legs and in my pants every time I fly.

I (and others here ) do have our facts straight. I am sure there are countries few of us travel to (perhaps Afghanistan, Iran) where security measures are comparable or greater than what passes for 'security measures' in the US (during non-elevated times). They are by far and away the rare exception. Too many folks of this forum travel frequently, around the world, for that nonsense to wash.

I (and others) have pointed out the lack of barking, the respectful treatment, and the absence of groping hands between legs, in pants, in necklines, the deliberate separation of pax and bags at the checkpoint, the inability to lock a bag and know that if it unlocked at the destination, baggage handlers are responsible, not airport security - these are all 'norms' around the world.

Equally, 'say your name', liquid tests in gate waiting areas and BDOs even following pax into airport toilets to continue questioning - those things are not the 'norm' elsewhere.

If you want to extrapolate the harshest experience you have had in unusual circumstances abroad to all or even the majority of experiences abroad, you are just being disingenuous at best or insulting to your readers at worse.

halls120

Well, let's start with the basic fact that lax gate security wasn't the cause of the 9/11 hijackings. Which, of couse, undermines the entire rationale for TSA in its present configuration.

We can add to the above the fact that in 2007-2008, an internal government study reached the conclusion that passengers weren't the biggest threat to aviation security. that study was never released because it undermined Skeletor and the Kipster's plan to add more oppressive and unnecessary passenger screening such as the ridiculous nudeoscopes - the latter rejected as ineffective by Germany and other countries that haven't lost their sanity when it comes to aviation security.

And let's don't forget that except for the UK, which has succumbed to US-style overreaction, that countries like Norway, Germany, France, Belgium, the Netherlands manage to deploy airport security measures that are efficient, respectful and low-key - in other words, everything that the TSA can't seem to do here - and the world hasn't come to an end because they don't engage in junk science or irradiate and grope air passengers in their countries.