NYers willing to take a frisk
So, what’s the big deal?
New York air travelers took their below-the-belt pat-downs and revealing full-body scans in stride yesterday as controversy continued to swirl over stepped-up airport security measures.
“I don’t mind at all,” said wheelchair-bound Gene Asendorf, 71, after undergoing a pat-down at La Guardia. “I’d rather be searched than sorry.”
Dorothy Whipple, 63, was both scanned and patted down as she prepared to board a flight at La Guardia to her home in Austin, Texas.
“It wasn’t stressful at all. They told me it was random,” Whipple said.
Despite the threat of a grassroots boycott of the screening procedures on the day before Thanksgiving — a move that could cause widespread chaos on the busiest travel day of the year — it was business as usual yesterday at both La Guardia and JFK.
“Do whatever you need to do,” 55-year-old Rick Bailer told a Transportation Security Administration agent at La Guardia as he passed through a checkpoint on his way home to Raleigh, NC.
“I had a knee transplant seven weeks ago, and the titanium sets the metal detector off . . . ” he said. “They patted me down, and it wasn’t bad at all.”
The cooperative passengers reflect the feeling of a majority of fliers — they support the X-ray scanners, according to a national ABC News poll.
Sixty-four percent of air travelers gave a thumbs-up to the machines, the poll said.
Still, fliers were split over the pat-downs, with 50 percent against them and 48 percent for them, the survey said.
TSA chief John Pistole pledged to review security measures in the wake of the outcry.
“If . . . we need to adjust the procedures, then of course we’re open to that,” he told ABC’s “Good Morning America” yesterday.
