NoS - Will old surgery scars trigger "pat down"?
 

Will be going through BUF and TPA security this summer. Regarding NoS, you think 20 year old scars (surgery) will trigger a lovely "pat down"? There's 4 of them and they're about 2 inches across.
Love the Flyertalk forums - very informative!

http://aprn.org/2011/03/16/represent...s-in-congress/

There are other threads on this topic, but I'm posting this link and text as a direct response to the question asked.

Anything can trigger a gropedown from the smurfs, including their pure whim.

They don't have to justify their actions to you - and the resulting attitude from them makes them dangerous to themselves and anyone near them.

The TSA is currently comprised of three types of employees:

1) Thieves, molesters, and other actual criminals.

2) People who enjoy the illusion of authority they are granted by their spiffy blue shirt, and enjoy lording it over the passengers.

3) People who simply can't get a job anywhere else for lack of ambition or qualifications.

There are those who claim they're trying to change the TSA from the inside, but they've shown absolutely no results whatsoever while the TSA continues its steep decline into jackbootery.

End result: if you want to guarantee that you are not molested by the TSA, do not go where they are. This includes airports, train stations, bus stations, and other public locations.

No they will not. They won't be visible, just like tattoos aren't.

TSA's use of AIT Strip Search machines may show an anomaly although TSA is only authorized to search for WEI.

TSA's AIT Strip Search Machines violate screening guidelines for exactly the reason you question, they do not detect WEI but do detect body anomalies that are no threat and no business of TSA.

Huh.

Are you saying that the Honorable Sharon Cissna is a liar?

That story just said irregularity, doesn't get any more specific than that. Doesn't say that it is a scar.

There have been many stories of pax who have been subject to pat downs for this and other equally rediculous reasons (one testicle bigger than the other due to an old injury, for example). I would just go for the pat down and sneer at the groper the entire time saying something like "I'm sure that feeling me up is making air travel soooo much safer!! (/sarcasm emoticon)"

I have been through a MMW several times and a backscatter once. I have 3 year old huge abdominal scar. It has never triggered a pat down. (I usually opt out of the backscatter for radiation reasons).

YMMV

There's no point in sneering at someone who is incapable of feeling either shame or empathy.

Do the TSA Body Scanners detect weapons?

While I strongly feel that breast cancer survivors' privacy and dignity are sacrosanct, I cautiously advise readers that in the case of most breast cancer survivors, "scars" are an emotionally necessary euphemism for consequences of life saving surgery that do indeed constitute physical irregularities. It is indecently cruel to dwell on this.

A scar that simply effects the skin usually will not register as an irregularity.

There's no need to believe that anyone's lying here.

"Sandra Fish, a correspondent with Politics Daily who's also had a mastectomy and had a similar TSA experience at Denver International Airport, offers insight as to why the scanner may have alerted to Cissna's mastectomy. She notes that her mastectomy and reconstruction is a composition of part of her lat dorsi (mid-back muscle) and a skin graft from her back, supplemented by a sac of silicone. In response to Fish's experience in Denver, Carrie Harmon, a TSA spokeswoman, explained that the so-called "Millimeter Wave" isn't intended to detect "fake breasts". She explained that the scanner looks for metallic and non-metallic items under clothing, and suggested it could have been something else inside Fish's body.

Thus it appears that the scanner is alerting to the silicone gel, and a plastic surgeon, Dr. Winfield Hartley, opines that this will continue until the image readers and the screeners get used to seeing implant imagery."

http://alaskapride.blogspot.com/2011...a-refuses.html

But but..the scanners aren't configured to an intensity that can see under the skin...so they "can't" be dangerous. :rolleyes:

Shin bones anyone??

Gotcha!
I suppose insult won't work either: "Did you know that you have really bad breath? Do you ever brush your teeth?"