The Harry Reid International Airport in Las Vegas, Nev. has installed a new self-service screening lane in an effort to speed up the TSA check process. This pilot program — part of the Science and Technology Directorate’s Screening At Speed initiative — will begin in January in an effort to determine effectiveness and efficiency. Airlines are seeing more travel than ever as people flood through airports around the country at higher than pre-pandemic rates. If the program is successful, we’ll see self-service scanning at airports around the country, if not the world. It’s unlikely this technology will just stay in Vegas.
“Like self-ordering kiosks at fast food and sit-down restaurants, self-service screening allows passengers in the Trusted Traveler Program to complete the security screening process on their own,” said Screening at Speed Program Manager Dr. John Fortune. “Travelers will use passenger and carry-on screening systems at individual consoles or screening lanes themselves, reducing the number of pat downs and bag inspections TSOs need to perform and freeing their time to be reallocated to the busier aspects of screening operations. The feedback we’ve already received during testing from both mock passengers and TSOs has been incredibly positive.”
Every time I go through security checks at major airports, the rules are different and I get yelled at for something dumb. Put your bag directly on the belt, not in a bin! Everything goes in a bin! Take your shoes off! Of course you don’t need to take your shoes off! That sweater counts as a coat, take it off! You can keep your hat, watch, and belt on! Laptops and electronics larger than a cell phone go in their own bin! Don’t take your laptop out of your bag, what are you doing? Have you never flown before? Thankfully each checkout lane of the new self-scanners will be equipped with a video monitor to explain step-by-step instructions to passengers. There will also be a help button for live assistance.
Will this make it better or easier to navigate security at the airport? Apparently this system relies on a pod-based design for travelers to use individual screening consoles (above). You put your carry-on in the little scanning bin, then stand in front of the milimeter wave scanner. A separate machine is being developed to scan travelers while they’re walking through a tube next to their luggage scanner (below).
This technology was initially intended for PreCheck customers, but the agency is working toward implementing these scanners across the board to speed up the process for everyone. Three different screening companies— Micro-X, Vanderlande Industries Inc., and Voxel Radar — have been awarded a series of contracts to develop what TSA is calling “self-screening concepts, prototypes, and hardware that enable new screening paradigms,” which is suspiciously Silicon Valley double-speak for a government agency.
Just like self checkouts at grocery stores, the lines will continue to build up as allocated workforces for these security hubs will continue to decline. Millions of Americans have already lost jobs to automation over the last decade. In the shake out of this new wave of automated security, how many will lose their jobs? And while we know that TSA is largely security theater, will this new process actually provide any benefit to the traveler or the tax payer?