Airport exposure

I had a great time this weekend traveling. We drove down to Buffalo, and then flew from there out to Baltimore. We did some shopping in Baltimore, spent two days sight-seeing in Washington, and then flew back to Buffalo and drove home again. All in all a fun trip.

But at the Baltimore-Washington airport, something weird happened to me. I was randomly selected to step into this big grey booth. I was directed to step in, put my feet on the yellow footprints and raise my arms. A few seconds and it was over with. The security agent spoke into a radio, and then told me I was cleared. I figured it was some sort of scan but really didn't know what had just happened to me.

When I was cleared moments later, my husband told me it was a whole-body imaging (aka millimeter wave scanning) booth. What's that? "It scans your body like an x-ray, just under your clothes," he told me, "It's very controversial."

Yeah. No kidding. At first I thought it was funny, and overall less invasive than a physical pat-down. But I just read up on it and it basically uses ultra high frequency radio waves to send an image of your body to a computer in a closed room apart from the security screening area. Just your body. Clothes are rendered translucent. The technician viewing the image never sees the subject in person, and the security personnel with the subject never sees the image. They say images are not recorded in any way (who really knows if that's true?). It boils down to - some stranger just saw me naked. The picture you see at left is an example of what these images look like. The faces are blurred, apparently (are they? There is no way for the traveler to be sure of this), but as you can see it gives a very clear image of everything else.

There were no warnings about health risks (or privacy invasion) at all, that I could see. Nor was I told verbally about any risks, or given the option for a pat-down instead. I honestly had no idea what was happening to me. In previous travels I have gone through one of those machines that puffs air at you, captures the particulate, and analyzes that for threats. On first glance I kind of thought this machine did the same thing - until I went through it.

Now if you've been reading what's going on with me lately you will know that I am pregnant. And although this pregnancy is sure to end in miscarriage for me, I am still concerned, until that happens, about what happens with my body. So are there risks to fetuses from ultra high frequency radio waves? Are there risks to me? I couldn't find a definitive answer.

All in all I feel a little violated. If given the choice to make an informed decision about going into that booth, I would have opted for a physical pat-down. I don't like the idea that an image of my naked body was just searched visually. It gives me the creeps.

So thanks a lot, Baltimore Washington International Airport, for an icky end to an otherwise great vacation.