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Full Body Scans Urged by LAX Police Leader to Increase Security
Photo by pink_fish13 via the LAist Featured Photos pool on Flickr
This Christmas, when a Nigerian man traveling into the US armed himself with explosives on his Detroit-bound Northwest flight, the hair-trigger reaction by airlines and airports and the TSA was to up security measures and to adjust policy for travelers entering the States from abroad. Now the "head of the Los Angeles airport police union this morning urged the federal government to require full-body scanners for every passenger at airport security checkpoints, saying metal detectors are no longer enough," according to LA Now.
The President of the Los Angeles Airport Peace Officers Association, Marshall McClain, believes that the events of Christmas Day show "that current screening methods cannot detect devices with little or no metal," and he believes that airports should make use of "all available technology and tools," in order to keep passengers and air crew safe.
McClain supports the use of whole-body scanners, which have been tested at 19 US airports, including LAX, and he claims they are "highly effective in keeping dangerous materials off airplanes."
Not everyone traveling through LAX has encountered these scanners, however, as they've thus far only been used on passengers flagged for secondary screening, but McClain is calling for their use on all passengers.
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