Transportation security officer says TSA workers doing their job

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SALT LAKE CITY -- Some airline passengers are fuming about security as they prepare to fly for Thanksgiving.

Stories about invasive pat downs are adding up, including viral video of a shirtless boy at the Salt Lake International Airport.

But, one transportation security officer tells KSL-TV, we're not getting the whole story.

"We're not there to assault anybody," says the transportation security officer, or TSO, who spoke to us on the condition of anonymity.

The video of the boy going through security has reached around a million hits on YouTube. Transportation security officers who do the work have been criticized and maligned since security changed three weeks ago. But, one officer told us Monday night, they're being vilified and insulted for decisions out of their control.

"We're not there to make fun of people as they go through the process," says the transportation security officer. "We're there to do a job."

A college student from Utah Valley University shot the video of the pat down Friday at Salt Lake International. Luke Tait says the boy was shy and having trouble going through security. The father held the boy's arms up twice, got frustrated, and took the boy's shirt off.

"I thought maybe they were a little too persistent on doing an exact thorough pat down on what seemed to be a 6 or 7-year-old boy," says Tait.

He says he was headed to talk to the father and son when a TSA agent stopped him and asked him to delete the video, which Tait refused to do.

But, the transportation security officer, who was in the area at the time, says the father was angry his son was getting a pat down, since he had not set off the alarm.

"That's what the video doesn't show, is that he is angry, being incredibly irate, I think, and tears the hoodie off of his son," the officer says.

The officer, who asked us to conceal his identity, says the officer tried to diffuse the situation.

"The TSO, not wanting the confrontation to go farther, just simply pats the boy down and sends them on their way."

With all of the negative scrutiny, the source says morale among transportation security officers is horrible. He says they're not a "bunch of lechers" ogling over scanner images, they aim to protect people's privacy.

"They're starting to question, why am I even here," he says. "If I have to take this kind of abuse from the public, from places like 'Saturday Night Live,' and political cartoons, why do this?"

But, regular fliers like Bettie Fuchs, have questions too.

"Why me? I'm a 62-year-old grandmother."

Fuchs says she was brought to tears in Salt Lake Saturday. She and her husband split time between Salt Lake and Arizona. Fuchs went through the full-body scanner, but was given a pat down after a hand swab showed something.

"I cried all that afternoon, that night," she says. "I'm trying to get over this because I've got company coming for Thanksgiving here, and I need to get out of this mood." Now, she fears her next flight.

"It was humiliating," Fuchs says. "It was demeaning, and I could not say anything."

Fuchs says she was never told what they detected on her hands, and she was released for her flight.

The transportation security officer says, if travelers don't like these procedures they should contact their lawmakers and the heads of the TSA and Homeland Security. He says, don't blame the screeners, they're following the rules.

Despite the outcry, the Secretary of Homeland Security Monday made clear: there will not be any big changes to the TSA body scans and pat downs, but there will be some small changes. Fewer passengers will get touched.

E-mail: jboal@ksl.com