A new security regime has been brought in at Heathrow airport in which travellers are being taken for full-body scanning if they are thought to be suspicious.
Britain’s biggest airport operator said the system is aimed to stop terrorist acts as well as attackers. The scanners will be lauched in each of Heathrow’s 5 terminals, and are to be used randomly, in addition to being used on suspicious travellers.
Last month the firm launched a three-month trial in “behavioural assessment” during which staff were trained to spot passengers acting suspiciously and refer them to the police or security guards. The question should be asked, if not everyone is being scanned, then how do we know all terrorists and attackers are being caught?
BAA confirmed that it was updating its security in the wake of the Christmas day plane bombing attempt in which a passenger was charged with trying to blow up a flight bound for Detroit.
Within weeks of the attack the British government confirmed that full-body scanners would be rolled out across the UK starting with Heathrow and Manchester airports, backed by the use of sniffer dogs and further use of handheld swabs to test passengers’ bags for traces of explosives.
“We are trying 
to get to a security regime, some of which is visible, some which is invisible. That makes it much more difficult for terrorists to plan reconnaissance.”
BAA said the reaction of passengers to body scanners was “pretty positive”, with hundreds of travellers screened so far in a process lasting no more than a minute for each passenger.
The scanners work by bouncing radio waves off the human body to form a 3D image. Both types of technology address privacy fears by using software that obscures elements of the image including passengers’ faces. The images from the scanners cannot be saved, transferred or printed and are deleted immediately.
Tell us what you think. Are the full body scanners a great way to stay safe? Or are they a breach on our privacy?
About Tessa Biddulph
Other articles by Tessa Biddulph
Tessa Biddulph works in the marketing department and is new to Bales Worldwide. She is spending a year at Bales Worldwide before heading back to university to complete a PR degree. Tessa’s favourite destination she has travelled to is Sydney, Australia, but since working at Bales she has already drawn up a long list of places she’d like to visit (number 1 being Machu Picchu, in Peru). 
“The question should be asked, if not everyone is being scanned, then how do we know all terrorists and attackers are being caught?”
Why are only a selection scanned?
“BAA said the reaction of passengers to body scanners was “pretty positive”, with hundreds of travellers screened so far in a process lasting no more than a minute for each passenger.”
Ok, a minute per passenger.
So how long would it take to screen all the passenger content of ONE average sized jet? Say, for example, a 250 seater? Just over 4 hours!
And how many aircraft per airport per day?
So how many WEEKS would it take to screen every passenger booked in for one single day?
Bottom line is, enjoy travel and all the elements involved in it, if Full Body Scanners save one life, they are worth it, okay so there may be the odd delay, take a book, a pack of cards, play eye spy ….. it may feel like an infringement of your privacy, I would prefer to get on a plane feeling that it was safe or safer and leave the security guards having a laugh at my strange body…. or even have a laugh with them. These people have a tough job and after all they are trying to make things as safe as possible. This is only my personal opinion and I have considered it from all sides as any reasonable person should, I know there will be people out there who disagree, but for me I love travel, from planning, to packing, to leaving the house, all the fascination of airports, that surge of excitement as the plane lifts off, to getting to your chosen destination… bring on the body scanners, it will be another part of the exciting and interesting journey.
If they help combat terrorism in the air, a full body scan is a small price to pay for extra security.
I think that these are all valid points. However attackers and terrorists are often very clever at masking their “suspicious behaviour”. I agree with Jay, in that this is perhaps not a fool proof method of ensuring safety. However if they do decided to scan all travellers this may be the way forward? But this might mean that the passengers end up queuing for a very long time. I suppose it is worth the time. I think that in the long run (once they’ve ironed out a few potential kinks), this could be a great way to ensure our safety at airports.