A revealing look at security screening By Jayne Clark, USA TODAY Have you heard the one about the nun in the Amarillo, Texas, airport? A=20 surprised inspector opened her suitcase to find 10,000 condoms that were=20 destined for a relief project in Africa.Though the story may be the stuff=20 of urban legend, it illustrates this new reality: At the airport, what's=20 tucked inside your bag isn't sacred anymore. In fact, it can be hazardous=20 to your dignity. Ditto for cruise ships, which have been on high security alert after 9/11=20 and reserve the right to thoroughly search passengers' luggage. And last=20 month, some customers flying on commuter airlines were chagrined to learn=20 they had to divulge their weight before they could climb aboard. (The FAA=20 was attempting to determine whether guidelines for estimating passengers'=20 weights were accurate and has since ended the test.) Planning a trip? Carry= =20 a government-issued ID, wear clean socks and hang onto your self-respect.=20 Most travelers appreciate that an era of Code Orange terrorist alerts calls= =20 for extraordinary measures. But humiliating measures? From full-body=20 friskings to revealing one's weight to having unmentionables displayed,=20 travel security is increasingly causing red-faced moments. "I had a short nightgown displayed for Spokane's traveling public, and each= =20 piece of underwear not strapped down fell to the floor as (the screener)=20 went through the contraband," says Kathi Ramirez, 50, of Fremont, Calif. "I= =20 have never been so embarrassed in my life." Ramirez, an account executive=20 for a technology company, travels frequently for business and says=20 conditions have improved since federal employees took over at airport=20 security checkpoints. Still, she adds, "There are just so many C cups they= =20 can handle before becoming immune to propriety." Travel agency owner Alan=20 Gerstner of Wilmette, Ill., thought he had the security routine down pat.=20 But on a jaunt in December through Chicago's O'Hare airport, he got hung up= =20 at security for 25 minutes. The offending substance: Metamucil. In the=20 process of searching his toiletry bag, the screener removed an unmarked jar= =20 containing the powdered laxative. The exchange, according to Gerstner, 49,= =20 went something like this: Screener: What's in the jar? Gerstner: Metamucil. Screener (speaking loudly): WHAT IS METAMUCIL? Gerstner: It's a laxative. Screener: A WHAT? The screener fetched a supervisor, who asked Gerstner, "So what is this= stuff?" Gerstner: Metamucil, a laxative. Go ahead and taste it. Supervisor: No way! The supervisor fetched a manager who examined the contents, went through=20 the what-is-this? drill and ultimately confiscated the jar. "It was a slow= =20 morning. There was no one there when I got there. There was a crowd when I= =20 left. And they all knew I had Metamucil," Gerstner says. But like Ramirez,= =20 Gerstner believes conditions are getting better at the airports. "They're=20 not taking stuff out and just leaving it there. They're actually repacking= =20 it," he says. The new Transportation Security Administration, which by=20 mid-November had taken over the task of passenger screening in all 429=20 U.S. airports, is generally drawing high marks from travelers. Even Judith= =20 Martin, the finicky syndicated columnist known as Miss Manners, praised=20 screeners for their professional courtesy in a column. Besides technical=20 training, the TSA's screener curriculum (45 hours of classroom instruction= =20 and 60 hours of on-the-job training) puts a heavy emphasis on=20 customer-service principles, from maintaining eye contact to asking instead= =20 of ordering. They're taught to be courteous while "understanding that the passenger=20 isn't necessarily going to enjoy this," says Kurt Krause, a former Marriott= =20 executive who was recruited by TSA to develop the customer-service=20 curriculum. " 'Yes, ma'am' and 'May I?' go a long way." Of the initial 1.6= =20 million applicants for screener jobs, 100,000 were interviewed and assessed= =20 for qualities such as patience and responsiveness. The 55,000 who were=20 hired "came through a very extensive battery of tests," says TSA associate= =20 administrator Gale Rossides. Thus far, their attrition rate is a mere 4%,=20 even more remarkable considering it was 100% to 200% annually under the=20 previous system, in which the airlines hired private security companies.=20 But no amount of classroom role-playing can prepare screeners for every=20 situation. Take the exchange =97 or lack thereof =97 that Walt Greene, a=20 straight-talking University of Texas-Pan American professor, had with a=20 screener who questioned him about a medical device that helps the=20 73-year-old maintain an erection. "She dropped it back in my suitcase and turned beet red," he says. "And she= =20 didn't want to inspect anything else." Chuck Peterka, a 53-year-old restaurant owner from Oxford, Ohio, drew a=20 similar reaction at Paris' Charles de Gaulle airport. Lacking the French=20 skills to tell the soldier wielding "a very serious gun" that the metal in= =20 his knee replacements was setting off the alarm, Peterka started to drop=20 his pants to show him the scars. The military man blushed and waved him=20 through. But airline passengers can't say they haven't been warned that what's in=20 their bags is subject to scrutiny. Not so with the busload of cruisers=20 being ferried last month from the Orlando airport to Carnival Cruise Lines'= =20 Fantasy. En route, the driver announced that security had been tightened,=20 and they should be prepared for bag searches more thorough than those at=20 the airports. Some passengers visibly blanched. And one woman quipped, "What about my sex= =20 toys?" Carnival spokeswoman Jennifer de la Cruz says all bags are=20 electronically screened, though if a hand search were needed, the passenger= =20 likely would be contacted. "I think it's understood and expected there's going to be an intensive=20 security screening," she says. Meanwhile, maintaining a sense of humor =97= or=20 at least a calm demeanor =97 seems the best strategy for maintaining one's= =20 dignity in times like these. John Palshaw, 70, of Carmel, Calif., figured=20 casual attire =97 shorts, sandals, no belt =97 would help him breeze through= =20 airport security on a January trip out of Monterey. Instead, the screener=20 "felt obliged to put his hand inside my shorts behind where the belt buckle= =20 would have been. I told him there was nothing in there but fat," says the=20 marketing firm owner. "I think he's still laughing." And Virginia-based=20 aerospace executive Douglas Manuel is just grateful for small favors.=20 "Every time I fly and am forced to remove my shoes, I'm grateful Richard=20 Reid is not known as the Underwear Bomber," he says. *************************************************** The owner of Roger's Trinbago Site/TnTisland.com Roj (Roger James) escape email mailto:ejames@xxxxxxxxx Trinbago site: www.tntisland.com Carib Brass Ctn site www.tntisland.com/caribbeanbrassconnection/ Steel Expressions www.mts.net/~ejames/se/ Site of the Week: http://www.tha.gov.tt/ TnT Webdirectory: http://search.co.tt *********************************************************