at FLL Terminal 2 (Delta Airlines) this morning.

These units were recently installed but not in FULL operation as they are now. The way they have the various lines entering the WTMD, the X-ray unit is more like a 2ndary scan except line #1. Line #1 is set up to be the X-ray unit primarily.

I politely refused this morning. You should have seen the look on the TSA's faces.

I was immediately approached and asked again by a TSO with a walkie talkie on his shoulder who kept repeating......."we have someone who is refusing".

I was asked why I was refusing. Now lets' note there is a sign in plain site of the TSA and the X-ray and WTMD that states you can refuse to enter the X-ray unit and will be required to have a pat down.

Again I was asked why I was refusing.......and I stated that I was a Radiologic Technologist and that's an x-ray unit and I am not going to add to the accumulated dosage that I have acquired in my 27 years in the profession. Or through the 13 years of air travel.

I don't care what they say. This is not a proven safe method of radiation exposure.

Now I will say the TSA didn't retaliate by taking their time performing their duties, which included: the physical pat down, swabbing of my hands, swabbing of my laptop and going through my luggage and computer bag.

We all had a nice conversation during all of this and I was approached by a TSO who again asked me why I refused to walk through the X-ray unit and once again I stated my professional reasons.

I said they better get used to doing this to me every week because I will never walk through the X-ray unit and they joked and said yes we'd better remember your face. And I laughed and just told them my name saying they might remember that better.

I will also note that there seemed to be a lot more TSA manning the lines today than I have ever seen before at FLL Terminal 2. I wonder if this is because of the x-ray units??

So is the bag search mandatory if you refuse? If so, it sounds like retaliation.

I guess by retaliation I should have stated they didn't do each "search" one at a time. As I was being patted down by one agent 2 others where going through my luggage, computer bag and swabbing at the same time.

So they didn't slow me down.

I'm prepared in case they ever do slow me down on purpose. But I always arrive early to the airport because FLL can be a nightmare with the cruise ships disembarking and general uneducated traveler that loves to come to Florida.

Wirelessly posted (BlackBerry8830/4.5.0.138 Profile/MIDP-2.0 Configuration/CLDC-1.1 VendorID/105)

Allowing them to search your stuff while being frisked ranks right up there with leaving your keys in your car.

Also, make every single one of the who touches you (including the hand swabber) and your stuff change their gloves.

Yes, considering the majority of bags that go thru the xray do not get searched, regardless if the owner goes thru the WTMD or Nude-O-Scope.

I assume the regular xray scan of your bag showed no WEI, so a bag search for the "troublemaker who questioned Our Authora-tay" sure looks lke retaliation.

Wow, that would have bothered me. If someone is going through my bag (where I put my wallet when transiting the checkpoint) without me being able to closely observe them I'd object. I mean I know that sticky fingered TSO's are the exception but still. :-)

Can one of our resident TSOs please explain the reason to me why nude-o-scope decliners apparently have to have their bags searched by hand? Other than the obvious apparent answer of retaliation to discourage declining the nude-o-scope.

Declining the nude-o-scope has absolutely nothing to do with the chance there is WEI in your bag, unless TSA is profiling based on nude-o-scope refusal, which would be an interesting thing to admit.

Oh, and SSI isn't a valid answer either.

TMI. None of their business why you refused. You have that right and exercised it (and thank you for doing so, for whatever reason you have). I am certainly not going to give them a reason.

I haven't had my bags searched either time I've refused the Nude-o-Scope. I have refused to remove my shoes as well both times, and had my shoes swabbed..

My new strategy is to make sure I eat some stuff that will make me really gassy, and when the screener is running his hands over my butt, I'll let go with a hell of a fart. This is going to take a lot of timing and discipline of course, but it will be great once I get it all right.

Me either. "Talk to the hand."

Fundamentally I agree, but there's an interesting tradeoff between exercising your right to refuse with no explanation and potentially educating the TSO and passengers within earshot of the potential risks of the strip search machine.

Bolding and editing mine.

I think this post is self-explanatory...

I agree with you. I don't mind at all mentioning the risks and pointing out they might want to be concerned too.

Congrats, haven't been selected yet, but will do the same.

I'd answer the first TSA why, but after that, its "talk to him".
I don't repeat myself.

How long did the process take ?

Did you feel you needed to tell them to speed it up, because they left you at times ?

Actually they made me take all of the money out of my wallet and hold it in my hand. And I was only 5 feet away from the other agents going through my luggage and I was watching them the entire time my body was being patted down.

Had I witnessed anything out of the ordinary I would have stopped the pat down and demanded a supervisor immediately.


As for telling them why I didn't want to walk through the X-ray unit I felt it is necessary to "educate" them that it is ionizing radiation. They are standing right next to the unit. Where is the lead shielding? By radiation protection standards there is a 6 foot minimum when x-rays are being produced. You see us x-ray techs behind a lead wall when we are taking your x-rays.

Maybe the TSA will start having high incidents of cancer or other radiation health issues and then someone will realize that this type of unnecessary exposure is not worth it.

I will never believe this is safe. As I was being patted down I watched many children being sent through the x-ray unit. That's just asinine.


The whole process probably took less than 8 minutes. They all changed their gloves. Even the TSA doing the pat down changed his gloves in front of me and informed me before he was going to do this and how he was going to touch my body during the pat down.

Not once was I left alone. Someone was around me the entire time.



It will be interesting how many times I will have to go through this at FLL Terminal 2. I have a flight every week until the end of August. I will use the other security lines to see if I get selected to stand in the X-ray unit since I observed that line #1 is set up to use the X-ray unit as the primary scanning.