Radiation has nothing to do with it ?!?
 

Thought about adding this to this thread, but it has become about lawsuits.

This morning at RDU I opted out of the nude-o-scope. The TSA person (who was very polite) asked me why. I told her I do not believe what the government says regarding radiation exposure.

Professional in all other ways, she said -- and I wrote it down to quote:
"Radiation has nothing to do with it. There is no radiation. It is just radio waves. I went through 25 hours of training on this thing, and that is all it is."

Am I wrong in understanding that the 'scope uses X-rays -- that is, ionizing radiation?

Misunderstanding regarding the electromagnetic spectrum certainly could explain why she thinks it is just radio waves -- after all, both radio and X-rays are part of the spectrum. But one would expect the training to be cystal clear, taking into consideration that very few of the trainees have degrees in physics.

To add regarding new pat-down:
I got the "new" pat-down, and it sure was more thorough than last time I experienced it. I know some will accuse me of being "sheeple," but I'm not going to hassle the working stiff who is doing is job -- unless he does it inconsistently with what Flyertalk teaches me about the procedures.
He seemed to be a stickler for procedure. He insisted that I listen to him explain the entire procedure. Then he stopped every step of the way and reiterated the explanation of the next step. And he did exactly what he said he would. And standing watch over my carry-ons, jacket and shoes, another TSA person witnessed. All according to the procedure as I understand it. Whether the procedure makes sense from a security point of view, I am not qualified to judge. All I can judge is whether they follow the procedure, and do so courteously. They did.

Finally, from the Jay Leno department of TSA:
Perhaps soon to be unemployed by TSA and working for WN as a flight attendant, one barker sprinkled one-liners into his speil. As in: "be sure to take off your jackets. Or, if you want, just take it all off (gesturing toward the nude-o-scope)." Maybe he's one of us doing undercover work.

What an idiot. :td: I hope you file a complaint.

RDU had 1 MMW scanner when I was there in May of this year. MMW uses non-ionizing radiation unless the backscatter scanners that use x-rays.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Millimeter_wave_scanner

OK, so how to tell the difference between the Millimeter Wave Scanner and backscatter x-ray scanner?
There now are multiple scanners at RDU, soon to be one per line.

Based on the systems I have seen, the physical layouts are different. Backscatter WBIs put you between two open rectangular boxes for the scan. Millimeter Wave WBIs have you step inside a glass octagon.

MMW devices look like a large, glass-enclosed phone booth, with prominent L3 labels on the top edges.
http://www.sds.l-3com.com/products/i...PS_Jan2010.jpg
(image sourced from L3's ProVision pages)

Backscatter devices come in two flavors, both of which look like large boxes, manufactured by Rapiscan Systems. One version requires two boxes, which the passenger stands between, facing one of them (boxes form two walls, with an open pathway in the middle and no overhead obstruction). This version is capable of performing simultaneous front/back scans.
http://www.rapiscansystems.com/image...le-pose-sm.gif

The other version looks like a single wall from the previous description, and requires the passenger to receive two scans, based on reading the Rapiscan pages.
http://www.rapiscansystems.com/image...ng_imaging.gif
(images sourced from Rapiscan Systems pages)

Thanks for those pictures DevilDog438.

CLT definitely has Backscatter...the single pose flavor.

I'm hearing from some that the L3 MMW NOS are being replaced with the backscatter X-ray machines.

According to this thread (List of Airports with NoS), RDU has MMW. While the attitude displayed by the screener leaves a lot to be desired, in this case it appears she was accurate in saying that it's "just" radio waves.

Technically, any energy in the electromagnetic spectrum is radiation, so she got that part wrong. But, as deldel has pointed out, radio is non-ionizing radiation, unlike x-rays.

And I think TSA takes advantage of the (understandable) confusion among passengers and the (unnecessary) confusion among screeners about the two technologies. They tell a passenger (accurately) that the MMW machine is just radio waves, and at the next airport, a screener tells the same passenger (wrongly) that the backscatter machine is "safe." Not enough people have the knowledge to know the difference between the two types of NoS.

Nevertheless, her attitude and that of the barker are unprofessional.

Thanks to all for the clear explanations. Nice to have it all in one place.

Even setting aside the fact that radio EMR causes changes to nerve cells cultured in petri dishes -- given that I am unable to discern between the two types of machines, I will continue to opt out.

That said even though I grew up adjacent to high-tension electric power lines and the electromagnetic fields clearly have had no eff...
ct
no electo fect bzz uh?
hm, earn miles
run
No effect
bonus bzz??

I'm OK.

wonder how long before a groper gets a knee in the chops.

hope its a woman that does it

:mad:

I cant believe you post things like that:
1. The officers on the line are doing what they are told.
2. Some one is going to be hurt.
3. It will not prove to be effective for anything.
4. It will result in local, federal charges and loss of airline flight priveledge.

Not to Godwin myself, but I've heard that somewhere....

And how is a common passenger supposed to know that? How do we know that a given "enhanced" patdown is being performed properly?

Re #1, the employee can do something else!