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Helena Airport Manager Blocks TSA From Taking Full-Body Scanner
OverTheGeicoE writes "TSA recently announced that it would remove all of Rapiscan's X-ray body scanners from airports by June. As part of this effort, it is trying to move a millimeter-wave body scanner from the Helena, Montana airport to replace an X-ray unit at a busier airport. Strangely enough, they have encountered resistance from the Helena's Airport Manager, Ron Mercer. Last Thursday, workers came to remove the machine, but were prevented from doing so by airport officials. Why? Perhaps Mercer agrees with Cindi Martin, airport director at Montana's Glacier Park International Airport airport, who called the scheduled removal of her airport's scanner 'a great disservice to the flying public' in part because it 'removed the need for the enhanced pat-down.'"
I'm thinking Ron may have been doing most unprofessional things at the scanner monitor. Perhaps ween him off the free peep show slowly.
What political party do you join when you don't like Bible-thumpers *or* hippies?
The scanner "removed the need for the enhanced pat-down".
Anyone remember the times before the scanners? There were no enhanced pat-downs, those came with the security theater of scanners. It was just a metal detector and a pat-down was only when the metal detector beeped.
It seems we're at the point now where we don't question any more whether or not a security measure is useful (haven't seen any proof yet that the pat-down or the scanner are beneficial at all), but the debate is now only about which pointless "security" measure is the preferred method of wasting time and money.
I am unqualified to suggest how the Montana version of the enhanced pat-down might be likely to go, but the Backpage girls want to charge a bit extra...
Happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know.
Ernest Hemingway
It's certainly a huge waste of taxpayer dollars and makes you wonder why airport fees are so high when these agencies seem to be committing to the wrong technology over and over.
The TSA has to remove the Rapiscan machines because they couldn't patch the software to remove customer-specific imagery? Why use them in the first place?
I wonder how much money was flushed down the drain on those babies ... I wonder how long the new machines will last before they get replaced ... and now small airports are back to full body cavity searches which is why these machines existed in the first place ...
because it 'removed the need for the enhanced pat-down.
Or you could just, you know, let people pass through the metal detectors.
You know, how all airports used to do, and smaller ones STILL do?
What do I know, I'm just an idiot, right?
People love their security theater. In response to employees watching too much scary stuff on 24-hour cable news about shootings, my employer recently instituted some unnecessary and ineffective "security" measures. They seem to be based on the mushy logic that greater security results in inconvenience, so any new inconvenience probably increases security, and the staff seem to find it comforting to have to jump through extra hoops to get from one part of the office to another.
http://alternatives.rzero.com/
Read the article, he doesn't want to remove it because they don't need to do enhanced patdowns while they have the machine. If they remove the machine, they will have to do the pat downs again.
Perhaps the poster should read the article more carefully.
“People had become comfortable with the scanner. It certainly did speed the process and removed the need for the enhanced pat-down.”
She's stating that the scanners that are being removed had eliminated the enhanced pat-down.
"'removes the need for the enhanced pat-down?"
Telling the TSA to get the fuck out of your airport and re-installing private security with more common sense than your average peanut shell.
The only reason TSA is pervasive is because it is a government handout, replacing the measures they had in place before 9/11. IIRC, there is absolutely nothing preventing airports from replacing TSA with their own security.
The complaint that it 'removed the need for the enhanced pat-down' was from Cindi Martin, not Ron Mercer. So it's quite possible that you've pinned the wrong motive on him.
I am officially gone from
Just because the machine is there, doesn't mean it will still get used if TSA says it can't be.
Wow. Misleading headline is horribly misleading. Quote from one of TFAs:
i.e., it's not the "removal of the scanner" that "removed the nead for the enhanced pat-down," as the headline deceptively implies. Rather, the scanner itself removed the need. However, as a seasoned frequent flier, I'm quite acquainted with the fact that security checkpoints that do not have body scanners are not subject to an "enhanced pat-down," as Martin implies in the article.
So... how many confirmed terrorist attacks have these scanners actually stopped, that previous procedures wouldn't have? How about drugs smuggling?
They are complaining that if they get rid of the machines, they WILL have to do the enhanced pat-down. They aren't currently doing the enhanced pat-down. In other words, they want traffic to go through the airport faster, and the scanners speed things up.
The Iron Triangle must be broken.
I can think of no government agency more deserving of being defunded, though many others should follow.
The preceding post was not a Slashvertisement.
The only reason TSA is pervasive is because it is a government handout, replacing the measures they had in place before 9/11.
It's risk management. In short, no one wants to be the director of the next Logan International Airport -- the takeoff location for two of the four planes involved in the 9/11 terrorist attacks.
That doesn't excuse the BS security theater, but it gives the folks in charge an out in the event their airport is the next Logan.
!#@%*)anks for hanging up the phone, dear.
Either you are a âoetrollâ or you have a reading comprehension problem. What he said was:
...called the scheduled removal of her airport's scanner 'a great disservice to the flying public' in part because it 'removed the need for the enhanced pat-down
It's a poorly worded sentence that could easily be misinterpreted to mean "If you remove the machines, it will remove the need for enhanced pat-downs".
When they're putting on the glove, tell them to double bag it because you just got back from ______ and you're pretty sure there isn't even an English word yet for the horrific STD you picked up there.
How do metal detectors work against drugs & explosives?
Some people die at 25 and aren't buried until 75. -Benjamin Franklin
bevis and butthead now they should make a episode where they try to get jobs at the TSA.
Bullshit, they are doing them. You, as the screened, are allowed to opt-out. I do every time I fly.
For large sets, this will be our guide even unto death, for the LORD will work for each type of data it is applied to...
the millimeter wave (aka microwave, aka popcorn button) scanner in Helena is newer equipment that does not provide the peepshow images, folks. as such, TSA must deem it too nice to have in Helena. maybe they should do their grope act in New York and Phoenix and other large, visible places instead of out in the hinterlands. show their nonsense act for what it is.
if this is supposed to be a new economy, how come they still want my old fashioned money?
It's a poorly worded sentence that could easily be misinterpreted to mean "If you remove the machines, it will remove the need for enhanced pat-downs".
It is a CLEAR sentence that CLEARLY says that removal of the machine would possibly result in more "enhanced pat-downs". It is *NOT* ambiguous at all.
The OP is clearly trolling.
Replace "removal" and "scanner" with nonsense words so you can't use your pre-conceived notion of what the sentence means and see if it still is perfectly clear:
who called the scheduled obfrentation of her airport's widgetygook 'a great disservice to the flying public' in part because it 'removed the need for the enhanced pat-down.'"
So is it the scheduled obfrentation that removes the need for pat-downs, or the widgetygook?
The nude body scanners cause a public outcry because of privacy and safety reasons. Getting rid of them is going to make the public happy. Does the manager even pay attention to the public?
while
Does Helena have a paved road yet? Just askin'
Already done
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
Have gnu, will travel.
.. Why doesn't the Helena Montana airport just buy their own goddamn scanner?
Oh that's right, the TSA is just another enormous welfare program for airports nobody uses and morons nobody will hire.
I boycotted going to the states for the past decade, but finally succumbed to peer pressure and flew a couple of times to Vegas. The first time I went via NY and didn't encounter the naked scanners. The second time I went they had them both in France and the USA! Each time I politely asked not to go through, and they were very nice about it. They pulled me aside and told me they would find somebody to examine me and my luggage separately. Each time it didn't take long. Each TSA agent I came across stated they would only be touching my penis and testacles with the back of their hand. Honestly I found them actually very polite and honest people doing a shitty job. Sure if I was an American and believed it was a free democratic country I would have been pretty mad, but being a European already warned it was pretty much a Nazi state I was mentally prepared. Not really too bothered about a guy "touching my junk" as I knew that was a prerequisite of visiting America. There was no pressure to push me through the naked scanners though.
I really feel for you guys :-(. If you can end this ritual humiliation, it will be both good for yourselves and your international image.
Bon chances mes amis,
Phillip.
Property for sale in Nice, France
Attempting to travel, even via airplane, is not probable cause for justifying a search of any kind.
Infowars is like a great big blender without much selectivity: The smoothies that come out are always 'interesting', but the lovely strawberries and steaks that went in to it also had some rat turds thrown in as well.
When Americans have been persuaded to allow their adolescent children to be groped by some mouth-breather who barely scraped through Grade 10 and latched onto his minimum-wage airport job for the "fringe benefits", I guess there's only one conclusion. We can safely assume that, yes, bin Laden got exactly what he wanted as well as what he deserved.
I've calculated my velocity with such exquisite precision that I have no idea where I am.
I too, know people who died on 9/11. I also live in NYC. However, I do not share your opinion that we have to give up essential liberties as the price for 'safety'.
As you say, there are other options, you wanna be safe all the time, don't leave your house. You're more likely to die on the road getting to the airport than you are once you are on the plane.
A hijacking at this point is a near impossibility because the passengers will get out of their seats and beat the shit out of anyone trying to mess with the plane. The cockpit door is locked and armored. Done. We don't need the line for the grope-o-scan. We can go back to what we had previously, before 9/11 -- x-ray carry-on and metal detectors. That's fine.
Security is now so bothersome that the long line to go through security is now the appropriate attack vector of a terrorist/wacko. Just as people run into a shopping mall and start spraying gun fire, sooner or later the long line at security will be the target of a gunman.
So, don't go around thinking you're safer for being stripped of your rights, because you're NOT. As I said, you want to feel safe, don't leave home, stay in bed, don't go out into the world because the world is a dangerous place.
If telephones are outlawed, then only outlaws will have telephones.
Funny because it's true.