TSA's mm-Wave Body Scanner Breaks Diabetic Teen's $10K Insulin Pump 811
OverTheGeicoE writes "Savannah Barry, a Colorado teenager, was returning home from a conference in Salt Lake City. She is a diabetic and wears an insulin pump to control her insulin levels 24/7. She carries documentation of her condition to assist screeners, who usually give her a pat-down search. This time the screeners listened to her story, read her doctor's letter, and forced her to go through a millimeter-wave body scanner anyway. The insulin pump stopped working correctly, and of course, she was subjected to an invasive manual search. 'My life is pretty much in their hands when I go through a body scan with my insulin pump on,' she says. She wants TSA screeners to have more training. Was this a predictable outcome, considering that no one outside TSA has access to millimeter-wave scanners for testing? Would oversight from the FDA or FCC prevent similar incidents from happening in the future?"
new slogan (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:new slogan (Score:5, Interesting)
Wasn't there a Cornel (?) study showing that the TSA caused more American deaths (from people deciding driving was better than molestation) than terrorists over a decade?
Re:new slogan (Score:5, Interesting)
You have the same odds of being killed on an airplane by a terrorist as you do being killed by cancer from a body scanning device (1 in 30 million):
http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20120405/04390118385/tsa-security-theater-described-one-simple-infographic.shtml [techdirt.com]
Re:new slogan (Score:5, Funny)
they are relying on that 1 in 30,000,000 person being a terrorist. that way we all win.
Re:new slogan (Score:5, Insightful)
Spock: That is wise. Were I to invoke logic, however, logic clearly dictates that the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few.
Kirk: Or the one.
Killing an individual would be better for society than letting an individual kill bunches of individuals. You make a joke, but that is the way the TSA works. We are not people, we are statistics. There is no way to treat us as individuals.
Anyone who works with familiar co-workers every day, herding strangers through life, will never see us as individuals. Police, TSA, fast food - there is a bond with the people you know, the "us", and everyone else is "them".
It is psychologically impossible for the TSA as a whole to be sympathetic to individual situations, including mental illness and prosthetics or implants. It will never happen because of our innate need to group people socially, without drastic changes.
If it will not work, abolish it, that is the only other option.
Re:new slogan (Score:5, Insightful)
Killing an individual would be better for society than letting an individual kill bunches of individuals.
No, it devalues all human life. It would be better to prevent that individual from killing others and then bring them to justice, hopefully leading to their eventual reform.
Re:new slogan (Score:5, Funny)
Which 12? Me? You? Let's just toss everyone in gitmo to be safe!
Re:new slogan (Score:5, Insightful)
Isn't that what's been done? The US can now be modeled in function as a series of concentric rings of incarceration, with Guantanamo as the extreme axial center, and TSA operating the guarded outer perimeter...
Re:Homegrown terrorism ... (Score:5, Insightful)
.
One question lays to rest all this apologist nonsense. Was TSA formed in response to 1995 bombing? or 2009 plot? If you were concerned so much about "homegrown terrorism", why were all these measures taken in response to 911, an event that was NOT homegrown terrorism? That fact alone signifies that so-called homegrown terrorism was not really much of an issue.
As far as so-called homegrown terrorism is concerned, none the specific cases you cite, involve any flights apparently. I find that significant and interesting.
I mean the bombing of buildings... the shootings... it is pretty easy to get a gun(and by that extension explosives) in USA isn't it? What measures are there today to stop someone get a gun legally, and start shooting up people in crowded market street or in some mall? ... or in a bus? How exactly are your protected from occurances of such bombings or attacks at traffic stops, just by having scanners and pat-downs at some airport which is say, 40 kilometers away from the said spot? McVeigh carried out the attacks without any need of any conspiracy being discussed on internet or phone with anyone. So what exactly can all the internet/phone surveillance can do against such nutcases acting alone?
But I guess folks like you would rather not think logically and rationally and just drink the cool-aid, so that someone can take away your rights and tax money to give you a false sense of security.
There was a recent article on slashdot, where FBI itself cooked up a terrorist plot, went out of its way to motivate some criminal types by offering cash to plant bombs, and then arrested him and declared it to be a terrorist plot foiled by its diligence. And occasional murders by fringe lunatics/murderers happen in every nation, and have happened for centuries in fact. But it had to be you who had to come up and declared these murderers to be "terrorists" instead.
Key question : How do these security measures help, considering that a) a terrorist can easily plant a bomb just before the security check point and still blow up hundreds of folks in the waiting area. b) These machines are pretty much useless and have been repeatedly demonstrated to be so, with severe known flaws in them. c) Terrorists do NOT need to rely on a single method of attack. They can just plant a bomb at some political rally next time.
And to repeat, what are you hoping to achieve with all this futile circus? Save lives? Far, far more people die on road accidents. Where are the billions being poured into preventing that? Or is it that most of the 5000 at WTC were rich folks, whose lives are worth more than just random road-kills? You decide. It is all about proportions.
Only thing the government needed to do was put all foreigners entering the country under full surveillance. It should be easier than monitoring every single communication happening across the globe. But instead, they decide to declare war on its own citizens and you think this is fine.
Re:new slogan (Score:5, Insightful)
I think you were trying to imply it is senseless to avoid these scanners. However this just goes to point out how stupid the effort to prevent terrorism is. The risk is so low even with 9/11 happening that it make no sense to subject people to ANY kind of screening. People should be able to hop on a plane as easily as they hop in the car and drive to work or hop on the subway, a bus, or any other form of public transport ion which has no screening and lots of people.
Can jets be used as bombs? Yes. So what! There are lots of other more dangerous problems that we should be investing time and money in solving that should be taking precedent. Like cancer, global warming, and education.
Re:new slogan (Score:5, Insightful)
The TSA wants it to be equally easy as well, which is why they are trying to work their way into harassing citizens ("Papiere bitte") on every mode of transportation.
Re:new slogan (Score:5, Insightful)
How exactly do you calculate the risk of terrorism -- in this case hijacking or bombing? It's not as simple as taking the current number of hijackings and bombings, dividing by the current number of flights, ignoring the fact that screening is currently in place (and has been since the 1970's), and thus "proving" that we don't need screening of any kind.
And how are you accounting for the "success effect"? At one point in the early 70's there were over 60 hijackings in a single year, because they were fairly easy to do and they fairly easily achieved their goals (and hence were "successful")? If it were as easy to kill thousands or tens of thousands of infidels as walking on to a plane, do you doubt that there would be many more than there are currently? (In 9/11: we were incredibly lucky. Fully-fueled planes crashed into high-density areas and only killed, on average, about 1,000 people each. That's amazingly low, and it of course doesn't count the economic cost, rendering multiple city blocks uninhabitable for years, etc.)
Not saying that any kind of screening or abrogation of our rights and privileges can be justified. Just not feeling the honor system for flights would work out all that well.
Re:new slogan (Score:5, Informative)
WHAT 'screening in the 70's? Hell, as late as 1968, you could walk onto the tarmac, board a commuter flight, and buy your ticket on the plane. This was going on during riots in major American cities, militant groups screaming armed revolution and having regular shootouts with the cops, and hijackings were common enough that a skit on a national comedy show had a guy come into an airliner cockpit waving a gun screaming "This plane is going to Chicago!", and when he's informed it's already going to Chicago, claims "I was on this flight last week, and we ended up in Havana!"
All that was done was, they started placing a couple armed air marshals on board the most hijacked flights. No screenings. No patdowns. Yeah, they xrayed your luggage, but that was about it. Hell, they'd even let you smoke during the flight.
Re:new slogan (Score:4, Informative)
Then in 1972, somebody brought and explosive device onto the plane. Fortunatly they were able to land the plane and evac. A k9 unit was brought in, and the found the bomb with 15 or so minutes left. There were three incidents in 1973
Why you think hijacking aren't worth preventing is beyond me.
X-rays, metal detectors, and pat downs when the detector alerted where happening in 1969.
They became mandatory in 73(74?) by Nixon. It pretty much stop the hi-jacking and deaths. Yes, people where killed during hijackings.
"Hell, they'd even let you smoke during the flight."
I sure as hell don't miss breathing other peoples poison.
you want to blame someone? start with Jack Graham.
The TSA is overboard, but don't go on like safety was fine, It wasn't.
Re:new slogan (Score:5, Insightful)
Not saying that any kind of screening or abrogation of our rights and privileges can be justified. Just not feeling the honor system for flights would work out all that well
There is a vast middle ground between the invasive grope-and-scan system the TSA uses and the pre-DB Cooper honor system. The ease with which hijackings happened in the 70s-90s was largely due to the explicit policy of complying with hijackers demands. This policy was reversed about the same time the second plane hit the tower and, in combination with locked cockpit doors, pretty well assures that hijacked aircraft will not be effective guided missiles again.
Instead of making an attempt to balance the cost, inconvenience and, yes, risks of ever more invasive screening procedures, TSA throws up the terrorist bogeyman and tells us that if all this expense saves even one life, then it's all worth it. Events like this one serve to remind us that screening procedures, even those involving minuscule risks, when applied to hundreds of millions of people, cause morbidity. Morbidity that is much more predictable (and therefore more preventable) than terrorists. So, the question is: would you prefer safe magentometer-only screening and a 0.0000001% chance of hijacking, or body scanning, with a 0.0000001% chance of cancer and a 0.00000001% chance of hijacking?
Re:new slogan (Score:5, Funny)
You have the same odds of being killed on an airplane by a terrorist as you do being killed by cancer from a body scanning device (1 in 30 million)
BEDIVERE: So, logically...,
VILLAGER #1: If... she.. has the same odds of being killed on an airplane by a terrorist as she does being killed by cancer from a body scanning device then she's made of wood
BEDIVERE: And therefore--?
VILLAGER #1: The TSA are Terrorists!
CROWD: Terrorists!
BEDIVERE: We shall use my largest millimeter wave scanner!
Re:new slogan (Score:5, Funny)
TSA: bringing more terror to flight than actual terrorists!
Murder in the interest of public safety... (Score:5, Insightful)
Being an insulin dependant diabetic, they could have easily killd her. It could have failed the other way and dumped several days of insulin into her at once. I guess once she passes out, they would have done a body cavity search before calling the paramedics.
Re:Murder in the interest of public safety... (Score:5, Insightful)
She should sue the fuck out of them for starters.
Passing her machine through the scanner EVEN AFTER a doctor's note said otherwise is grossly negligent or reckless or worse.
Re:new slogan (Score:5, Informative)
Re:new slogan (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:new slogan (Score:5, Funny)
Re:new slogan (Score:5, Informative)
FROM THE ARTICLE:
Are people just too fucking lazy to even read before they open their big mouths?
Re:new slogan (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:new slogan (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:new slogan (Score:5, Insightful)
Given that this sort of radiation is not typically encountered in everyday activity, why would anyone think to defend against it? Casual use of millimeter-wave scanners is quite a recent phenomenon. Hard to fault the pump's engineers for not foreseeing that one.
Re:new slogan (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:new slogan (Score:5, Informative)
First, there was absolutely no need for her to pass through any sort of scanner, as is evidenced by her previous flights, when she produced the documentation and was given a pat-down search instead.
Second, the circuitry wasn't designed for this sort of radiation, since it's never encountered outside a lab - as even the summary makes clear.
Third, the scanners routinely emit a lot more radiation than the makers claim.
Re:new slogan (Score:4, Funny)
This has never been proven, and it *cannot* ever be proven as long as TSA won't allow anyone else to test the machines.
In the absence of evidence to the contrary, then, these machines must be deemed safe.~
Re:new slogan (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:new slogan (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:new slogan (Score:5, Insightful)
How exactly can it be the manufacturer's fault that their product doesn't withstand energy bombardment from a technology that was unknown to them for the entire duration of the product's development?
That's like trying to blame medieval armorsmiths for not making chainmail protect against tasers.
Re:new slogan (Score:4, Funny)
Re:new slogan (Score:5, Informative)
Type I diabetes is caused by the autoimmune destruction of the pancreatic islet cells which produce insulin. It has nothing to do with corn syrup or the FDA.
Re:new slogan (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:new slogan (Score:5, Insightful)
More like the needs of earmarked pork-barrel spending benefiting pockets of the few outweigh inalienable rights of the many.
Re:new slogan (Score:5, Informative)
I guess completely ignoring the fact that she was passed through a scanner that emitted radiation escaped both you and the author of TFA.
Or, perhaps you just don't give a fuck.
I'm diabetic, and my wife is. The reason for an insulin pump is because self-monitored injections can no longer keep up with the endocrine system. This young girl is not using a pump for convenience, especially not one that costs $10k. She is using it because it is critical for her survival.
Downplaying the risks, and the obvious unknown of these body scanners which fuck if anyone knows whether or how they really work, just makes you look like the most incredible god-damn asshole on the planet.
Just thought I'd mention that. These body scanners are FUCKING SECURITY THEATER that are ADMITTED TO NOT WORK.
Scanners gotta go. I do not fly anymore and I will not fly anymore until they are gone.
Effectiveness (Score:4, Informative)
>ADMITTED TO NOT WORK
Documentation:
Ben Wallace, a former employee of one of the company's manufacturing the scanner technology, announced on BBC Radio 4's Today programme that "...in all the testing that we undertook, it was unlikely that it (the airport scanner) would have picked up the current explosive devices being used by al-Qaeda" and that "... it wasn't very good and it wasn't that easy to detect liquids and plastics unless they were very solid plastics (Airport, 2010)."
Re:new slogan (Score:5, Informative)
As far as the "more radiation on the plane than in the scanner" hogwash, that is a more-or-less apples to apples comparison with the X-ray scanner -- not the MW scanner. First, what are the power levels at which the X-ray scanners and MW scanners operate? Are they comparable? I don't know, and I suspect neither does the commenter from the TFA. Therefore, that argument is invalid without more information. Second, I'm not a physicist, but my understanding is that X-rays have a lot more in common with cosmic rays (what you are exposed to in an airplane) than either of those forms of radiation have in common with microwaves (what she was actually exposed to). Therefore, saying that microwaves are safe for insulin pumps because the cosmic rays at altitude don't affect the insulin pump is a lot like saying UV-B is safe for skin because visible light doesn't cause either skin cancer or sunburn. They operate at different wavelengths, thus they have different effects.
Re:new slogan (Score:5, Funny)
When I come to work, I sneak liquor in by hiding it in my stomach.
The war on terror is over (Score:5, Insightful)
The White House just said the war on terror is over.
We don't need the TSA screeners any more, send them home and stop the unnecessary abuse of U.S. citizens.
Re:The war on terror is over (Score:5, Insightful)
You're forgetting that whenever you give up a right you rarely (if ever) get that right back (re: government).
Re:The war on terror is over (Score:5, Insightful)
Fair enough, fair enough. If getting back the old ones are so difficult, let's get some new ones, that are just like the old ones, but worded slightly different.
Re:The war on terror is over (Score:5, Insightful)
Anyone still blaming "those evil (Republicans|Democrats)" has clearly NOT been paying attention.
Re:The war on terror is over (Score:5, Funny)
Wait, are we talking about cell phone contracts again?
Re:The war on terror is over (Score:5, Informative)
The war on terror will never be over as long as the TSA is around. Radiation bombardment? Groping children? Sounds like Al-qaida has outsourced overseas.
Re:The war on terror is over (Score:5, Insightful)
Blowing up a plane was never the problem with 9/11; it was the fact that the terrorists got access to the cockpit and turned the planes into flying bombs that were then used to blow up two massive office buildings. That can't happen anymore, now that pilots close the door to the cockpit and the average passenger knows to swarm any idiot who tries to hijack a plane; all this other stuff is just theater perpetuated by security theater companies to keep getting money from easily frightened people.
Re:Losing business (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:The war on terror is over (Score:4, Insightful)
We don't need the TSA screeners any more, send them home and stop the unnecessary abuse of U.S. citizens.
Not only U.S. citizens - they abuse permanent residents and visitors too.
Re: (Score:3)
Hah, right! The war on terror is FAR from over. The White House plans to continue terrorizing its own citizenry with a false sense of fear and a need for government as their security blanket, for as long as it's politicaly useful!
Re:The war on terror is over (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:The war on terror is over (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:The war on terror is over (Score:5, Insightful)
Considering the Patriot Act was already drafted prior to 9/11, and that they went to far as to keep it secret and only allow lawmakers to read it under a declaration of secrecy shows that the Abuse of Citizens is the plan.
The war on Drugs, Terror et al are just code names for the War on the Constitution.
Constitutional Rights are an inconvenient obstruction to increased Power of the State and must be removed.
Re:The war on terror is over (Score:5, Insightful)
But if your predecessor started to beat me with a lead pipe, and then you stopped the beating, I would vote for you.
Re:The war on terror is over (Score:5, Insightful)
So, someone can beat you for 8 minutes with a lead pipe, I step in and beat you for 3 then stop. You'd still vote for me?
Re:The war on terror is over (Score:5, Funny)
So, someone can beat you for 8 minutes with a lead pipe, I step in and beat you for 3 then stop. You'd still vote for me?
tempting. Maybe if you told me that it was to prevent terrorism and protect the children.
forced? (Score:5, Interesting)
Wait a minute... I think the larger issue here is that they forced her through the scanner.
Maybe I'm wrong, but is that not improper? I thought they had to allow manual inspection at your request.
Re:forced? (Score:5, Insightful)
She is a teenager. I bet they bullied her into "voluntarily" going through the scanner.
Re:forced? (Score:5, Insightful)
Anything to get a mm wave look at some underage breasts.
Re:forced? (Score:5, Informative)
Ummm, go to any beach in Europe and knock yourself out.
We Americans are diseased in the head in many ways.
Re:forced? (Score:5, Funny)
Ummm, go to any beach in Europe and knock yourself out.
Very true. But unless you're willing to be groped, irradiated, swim *really* well, or have a lot of bucks for a ship ticket, it's kind of difficult to get to Europe.
Re: (Score:3)
Anything to get a mm wave look at some underage breasts.
Sadly, this may have some truth to it - she looks like a cute enough high school girl in the online picture in the article. TSA and Pedobear, BFF
Re:forced? (Score:4, Interesting)
Unless I am totally mistaken, the people who view the scanner images aren't even within sight of the screening area, precisely for this reason (so people can't be forced through the scanner to satisfy the prurient interests of creeps.) Granted, there are probably ways around it, but this sounds more like rank stupidity than unchecked ephebophilia.
Re:forced? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:forced? (Score:5, Interesting)
+1. Several women have been forced to walk through the scanner multiple times, in order for the men to get a better view of their nudity on the screen.
Re: (Score:3)
Last time I flew, they were putting all of the chubby women through. If you were a guy or skinny, you didn't go through. Bunch of bastards. Still, I had to completely empty my pockets including my ID and boarding pass; usually those are the two things I leave in my pockets. I don't know how that was a threat to national security.
IMHO, the terrorists won long ago. PATRIOT Act, Homeland Security, TSA, etc. have stripped away our freedoms. On 9/11/2001 people were use to the idea that terrorists would hijack a
Re:forced? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
A better word than forced would be 'coerced.' You NEVER have to get in their unsafe scanners. You can ALWAYS opt out.
Re:forced? (Score:5, Insightful)
Why lie?
"I want to opt out."
"Why?"
"Because."
"Why?"
"......"
"Why?"
"......"
You have the right to remain silent and are not required to give ANY answers to a government employee except your name and ID (varies from state-to-state).
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
And they have the power to detain you until you miss your flight.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Which is why you should give them the same courtesy you should be giving any other person, even if you hate them.
It's amazing what a little courtesy can do. If money makes the world go 'round, then courtesy is the grease on the axle.
Re:forced? (Score:5, Interesting)
They didn't force her. (Score:5, Insightful)
If you read the article the TSA agents advised her that the insulin pump would not be damaged by the scanners, despite a doctors note to the contrary. She took their advice, assuming they knew what they were doing, and chose to go through the scanner rather than requesting a pat-down.
While her actions are understandable, if she had simply requested a pat-down like the doctor instructed her to do rather than asking for a second opinion, this would have been avoided. Likewise if agents weren't so stupid as to disagree with a doctor's order on a matter they knew nothing about, this would have been avoided. Given their position of authority they should be liable for the cost of the pump since their negligence caused it to be destroyed.
Re:They didn't force her. (Score:5, Insightful)
She is likely to get the same response as another customer who asked, "How did my luggage get damaged? Why did the TSA cut the lock off?"
"GO TO HELL" scrawled on the complaint form.
Or maybe the handicapped soldier who asked, "Where did my 300 dollars disappear too? I put it right here in the tub."
"You causing trouble?"
"No sir."
"Then shut up or we'll bar you from flying."
The handicapped soldier boarded the plane & lost his 300.
Or maybe the woman with the breast pump who was told, "You can't take that onboard." She was then forced to demonstrate it to the TSA woman to prove it was a breast pump, else it would have been confiscated & junked.
Or the mother who was carrying milk for her newborn infant, and the TSA told her to dump it or else. She showed them printouts of TSA procedures and they tossed them in the trash. They then placed her in a glass jail for an hour, made her miss her flight, and refused to refund the ticket for the plane.
THE SA DOESN'T GIVE A DAMN ABOUT BROKEN DIABETIC PUMPS OR ANY OF THE FUCKING PASSENGERS. They are goons with power trips. They need to be fired and replaced with what we had pre-911 (xrays of baggage/metal detectors for passengers).
Re:They didn't force her. (Score:5, Insightful)
No, because I do not wish to exchange freedom for apparent security. I want it to be like it was up through the mid-90s: loved ones and friends being able to meet you or see you off right at the gate, children being able to be escorted directly to the gate by their parents, etc.
You know, LIBERTY.
I know, only the radical fringe lunatics believe in actual freedom nowadays.
Re:forced? OPT OUT (Score:3)
EMC compliance (Score:5, Informative)
However, there aren't regulations regarding immunity to mm-wave and THz scanners, and certainly not at the intensities these devices use. I suspect that, if you were to test a broad range of existing medical products, many of them would fail, because many of them have mm-scale electrical features (especially, circuit board traces) that would be highly susceptible.
Re:EMC compliance (Score:5, Informative)
From an electrical point of view, many medical devices are simply to sensitive to be made immune to induced interference. The noise will have to affect them some how. It is just a matter of how big the noise source is (magnitude), the frequency of the noise source (Hz), and what geometry it sits relative to the medical device (coupling.)
Obviously, the TSA has found a big enough noise source.
In particular, the difficulty with mm-wave interference is that it can induce noise directly onto the geometries of integrated circuits and thin-film devices. The only way to guard against the problem would be to heavily shield the chips in question. Maybe it is time for medical devices to start using radiation-hardened integrated circuits. Radiation hardened circuits are designed to withstand short and intense blasts of EMI, including high-frequency EMI sources.
Re:EMC compliance (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:EMC compliance (Score:5, Informative)
I did RF compliance and sensor design for two insulin pumps. An insulin pump is considered a Class 2 medical device, which means that it is an acceptable to stop delivering insulin and alert the user in case of a failure. The user would then rely on manual delivery until the fault cleared.
A Class 3 would be required to continue delivering therapy (and announce the error) in a single fault situation. This is reserved for devices where a manual fail-over isn't a safe option.
Re:EMC compliance (Score:4, Informative)
According to wikipedia ( I know I know ) Salt Lake City uses MM wave and not backscatter. Either way they microwaved and damaged a piece of medical equipment after assuring the user that it was perfectly save for that equipment. Unlike an implanted medical device the insulin pump would be susceptible to MM scans.
Re:EMC compliance (Score:5, Informative)
Is it possible to just leave? (Score:3)
In any case, I really hope she sues them and wins.
P.S. This is probably a good time to mention Rand Paul's End the TSA petition [chooseliberty.org] and bill. I'm not usually a big fan of him, but this is one thing I can get behind.
I would recommend not signing that (Score:5, Informative)
I don't know if it is a real petition or not, but what I do know is it is a real SPAM list. Ever since signing it, they've been bombarding me with shit asking for money and their opt out doesn't seem to want to opt out.
I am more than a little annoyed.
Re:I would recommend not signing that (Score:4, Informative)
Wish I had points to mod you up more. I've been bombarded with Ron Paul/Dudley Brown/etc after signing that crap. So annoying.
Re:Is it possible to just leave? (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes. By the police.
TSA agents are not police no matter how much they try to act like them. The real problem is people *need* to fly in many cases. This is a 16 year old girl on her way home - she didn't have the option to cancel a trip because of a bad tsa policy. She's also (in many states at least) too young to drive and definitely too young to rent a car from almost any company. That leaves busses and trains - without advance planning by a minor far from home. She had effectively no choice but to submit to screenings - and THIS is why the fact you cannot refuse TSA/FAA rules on the basis that flying is not a 'need' is utter bullshit.
RTFM (Score:4, Informative)
I'm rather surprised that the TSA doesn't (appear) to have a manual to deal with known issues like insulin pumps, joint prostheses, etc. I wouldn't expect rank and file workers to know the answer to everything but there should be a way to look stuff up.
Being rude, however, is absolutely never appropriate. Even if you think the person is the next 'medical device bomber' being professional and polite should always be required.
Re:RTFM (Score:5, Interesting)
Whistle-blowers have already testified that even they are not allowed to see the manual. Other countries consider the TSA to be a joke and a money-scam.
Everytime.. (Score:5, Insightful)
Every time there's a story about the TSA making life unpleasant for Americans, a terrorist gets his wings..
Congratulations, the terrorists have won.
forensic analysis (Score:5, Interesting)
I want to see the results of a forensic analysis of the unit to find out why it failed. if the scanner is putting out enough energy to permanently damage the circuits it's a strong argument against the safety of these things.
Re: (Score:3)
If it was a millimeter scanner, most likely there was resonance with circuit trace(s). A resonance in the right spot (input to an opamp for example) and you could say further operation is undefined.
The Terrorists win again! (Score:3)
I hope her parents sue the TSA for attempted homicide and win enough to bankrupt the US.
Jessie Ventura (Score:5, Interesting)
He has had hip replacement surgery. "Former Minnesota Governor Jesse Ventura is suing the TSA and Homeland Security for humiliating and ‘offensive’ pat-down procedures he’s been subjected to during airport security checks that included ‘warrantless, non-suspicion-based offensive touching, gripping and rubbing of the genital and other sensitive areas of his body.’ "
He is suing them in court.
TSA can't find people with common sense? (Score:3)
You read the paperwork. Look at the device. Screen the passenger without the scanner. Document the incident with your peers and/or manager.
Move on and save the agency $10k because you are allowed to act like a human being with common sense.
Slashdot has gone crazy... (Score:4, Interesting)
Wait--wasn't the pat-down useless anyway? (Score:4)
The article says:
She says TSA agents then made the situation worse when they didn't know what to do about her juice and insulin. "She said, because we don't have the machines to scan the juice to make sure this is not an explosive we do have to do a full body pat down and search your through your bags."
So, here is what I don't understand: how did the pat-down help the TSA determine that the juice and insulin were not actually explosives?
Well, now we've shown terrorists how to get explosives on a plane: pretend to be diabetic and bring your explosives in juice boxes and bags marked "insulin." Combine "juice" with "insulin" and get on the 5:00 news.
Re:avoid them thar rays! (Score:4, Insightful)
Electrical devices like that are full of amplifiers and things like field-effect transistors - things that take small changes in, and output much (relatively) larger ones.
It doesn't take much interference at all to cause problems, and this is made even worse that circuit traces etc can be resonant (where you most certainly will not) with the incoming interference, making things worse.
Re: (Score:3)
Yes, but with the revelation that there are more advanced bombs being created, how do we know that your "pacemaker" isn't just a surgically implanted bomb?
I just got a vision of seventeenth century witch trials, where a woman was tied up and weighted down with a stone, then thrown in the river. If she floated, she was a witch and burned. If she sank, she was not a witch (but likely drowned by the time she was fished out).
Now we'll just send you through the scanner, and if you die, it was a real medical devi
Re:Is she stupid as well? (Score:5, Insightful)
Because she's 16 and away from home, and probably just wants to get back. Quit expecting everyone to have a vigilate chip on their shoulder.
You know, as adults, we should have already fixed this god damned problem with our government - not expect our children to have to rise up against the man for something as simple and common place as a plane flight.
Not that easy (Score:4, Informative)
I believe insulin pumps are worn externally and not surgically inserted
Yes, indeed. You need to have physical access to the device to change the insuline supply.
and it should be a very small matter to take one off to get through a screening
it's not trivial to temporarily remove one and put it back. As the device is indeed external and the insuline has to be delivered in the blood flow, you might guess that there are sterile needls involved and similar. not something that is easy to improvise in a security line. also, between shutdown and restart of the device once re-attached, there's also risk of manipulation errors.
So either:
- the doctor make sure the patient is properly educated and able to remove / re-attach the device (she's 16, but even younger kids can have Type 1 diabetes, and might not be able to do the whole procedure without parents supervision).
- the doctor provides all the necessary equipment to remove and re-inject the needle (bio-hasard box for used sharp object where to discard previous needle, sterile swipes, new steril needles, steril bandages, etc.)
- the doctor provides all the necessary documentation so the patient get proprer clearance to carry around the equipement past the security check, including the pointy needles.
Or:
- the doctors just write a letter saying that it's just better to "opt out" of the scanner (as she has the right to do any way).
or even for the entire flight.
Getting disconnected from the pump for prolonged periods of time without proper medical supervision isn't what's best for the patient's health, as the girl explains hefself in the video.
Removing the pump and relying on syringes for insuline, basically amount to a switch of medication, including an overlap period where the body still cointains leftovers from the previous type of therapy and new drugs are injected (or at least a completely different new therapy plan has to be followed). Such switches might require medical supervision.
It should be possible to design a pump whose on-baord computer is able to calculate and print out recommandations how to continue from that point on with a classical syringe). But it's just much more easy to recommand "opting out".