TSA Mandating Body Scans for Selected Travelers

Donald Wood
by Donald Wood
Last updated: 9:35 AM ET, Mon December 28, 2015

Last week, the Transportation Security Administration announced that travelers who have been selected for enhanced screening will be required to pass through body scan machines.

According to FoxNews.com, people in the United States coming through airports during the busy holiday travel period between Christmas and New Year's will be subjected to body scans, but the TSA didn't reveal how they would be selected.

Travelers will be able to opt out of the full-body scan if they are chosen, but they will have to undergo a thorough pat down instead. The body scan - dubbed an Advanced Imaging Technology (AIT) screening - gives the TSA the ability to find nonmetallic images and liquids without doing a full strip search.

The addition of the new security barrier has been met with some concern from passengers at American airports. One of the main questions was about handicapped passengers, and Fox 25 spoke to a woman named Shirley Boseman, who walks with a cane.

Boseman said, "I can't stand and balance myself. What are they going to do with people that aren't able to do that? I mean some people aren't able to get out of their wheelchairs, period."

Other people like the changes, as passenger John Glass told Fox, "More security is great, but it just needs to be more efficient and better customer service and I think internationally they do a much better job than we do here, and I think that's the issue."

The TSA acknowledged that the new security measures will only impact a small number of travelers who are selected to pass through the body scans.


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