TSA to add up to 11 more full-body imaging machines in Atlanta
The Transportation Security Administration will deploy up to 10 or 11 additional full-body imaging machines at Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport by mid-summer.
The machines are being added to airports around the country in the wake of the Christmas Day terrorism attempt on a Delta Air Lines flight.
The TSA already has 40 of the machines at 19 airports around the country, including three at Hartsfield-Jackson. Last fall, it ordered 150 more of the machines and plans to buy an additional 300 beyond that.
The advanced imaging technology machines, as TSA calls them, show images of passengers beneath their clothes using radio waves or low-level X-rays to hunt for explosives or other weapons hidden on passengers' bodies. The concept has raised privacy concerns. TSA said its privacy features include blurring facial features, displaying images in a remote location and preventing storage of the images.
At most airports, including Hartsfield-Jackson, the machines are used for secondary screening if metal detectors go off, or for random screening. But in the next few months, TSA plans to shift those machines into use for primary screening, in place of a walk-through metal detector for those lanes. Passengers can opt for a different screening, such as a pat-down.
Eventually, TSA officials hope to completely replace walk-through metal detectors with the advanced imaging technology machines; but that is likely years off, said Scot Thaxton, assistant general manager for TSA’s Office of Security Operations. Thaxton talked about the machines at an airport symposium Friday.
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