From the stickied thread, it looks like the terminal we'll be using has the BKSX. For those who have dealt with this at OMA:

Are they funneling everyone through it, or just random pax?
What has been the demeanor/manners of the TSA agents?

Thank you.

I have been through OMA twice, once before the toys were installed and the TSA folk were friendly and courteous. I approach the checkpoint with a pleasant attitude and adjust from there.

The second time, earlier this month, they were cold. I got a good 30 seconds of magic flashlight on the ID. It is a single line that with both WTMD and NoS, they were feeding people through the backscatter as they could. One passenger would enter and the next 2 or 3 would get WTMD until the NoS was again available. I got the feeling that you could "forget" to put something in your bag and stall, thus giving someone else the lucky number.

I believe OMA was one of the first Flyertalk reports of the enhanced grope.

I've been going through OMA on Thursday or Fridays every week since July. I've seen WBI in operation maybe 4 times out of all those trips, all other times it's been roped off. The first time I saw it operational they were sending 1 person through WBI for each 6 or 7 people that went thru the WTMD. I got selected, it went poorly, long story chronicled in the beginning of the opt-out experiences thread. That particular time I dealt with a TSO that was a surprise-ball-grabber and rough.

However, the visits since have been pretty much uneventful. I was selected again a month later when WBI was in operation and got as much of a "professional" patdown as would be expected; TSO was courteous and communicative and didn't touch my junk. They'd always been polite before WBI as well, so I think they're mostly okay.

Edit: I happen to know that some of the TSOs there (at least one 3-stripe sup) are former prison guards. That may explain the occasional cold demeanor; some of them may be used to treating people without any rights.

Thank you! We vary between OMA and LNK when flying. I haven't flown out of OMA recently, but have always had pleasant experiences in the past regarding courtesy. Here's to hoping I'm getting myself worked up over nothing. And here's to hoping that the rest of the airports I'll be dealing w/in the coming months will be the same (PDX, BUF, LAX, possibly ORD if we opt to kill time at the USO). Good times!

Wow...prison guard to TSO is a downgrade, IMO.

At least a TSO's "clientele" won't try to hurt him....yet.

admittedly cannot speak to current OMA conditions...I flew through there in late August, but backscatter was in place.

There seemed to be some measure of training going on and so they were pulling out people before they got to the machine for the patdowns. Do not remember if they had the WTMD in use or not.

The patdowns at that time were consistent with what I get when I enter a Texas prison to meet with a client (Texas ramped up their entry processes for employees and visitors in wake of the cell phone issues a few years back) and were consistent with a Terry frisk. It was NOT the groping that seems to be more and more commonplace.

I do not know if I would have had a different patdown had I opted out (which I had PLANNED to do before the random selection).

The reason I believed it to be a training day was the sheer number of smurfs that were around and that verbal instruction was being given related to the pat process. It was also the first time I had encountered a domestic situation where all pax had to show ID a second time as they went into the ramp tunnel, again with what looked like trainer/trainee staffing levels.