"We're not going to be in the business of doing body cavities," John Pistole, the head of the Transportation Security Administration, told reporters at a breakfast this morning. "That's not where we are."
The agency has faced a barrage of criticism and public outcry this month as it's expanded the use of new screening technology that provides graphic images of the body, while also carrying out more intimate pat-downs for passengers selected for secondary screening or who decline to go through the new imaging screeners.
Ted S. Warren, AP
Airline passengers can still be subjected to pat-downs by TSA officers, but "We're not going to be in the business of doing body cavities," TSA chief John Pistole said.
The new procedures and technology are designed, in large part, to address concerns that terrorists could place a bomb in their undergarments, similar to Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the so-called "underwear bomber," who boarded a Detroit-bound flight last year on Christmas day with explosives sewn into his underwear.
Publicity surrounding the new, enhanced pat-downs have focused on several sensational cases, such as a cancer survivor who says he was left soaked in his own urine, and a breast-cancer survivor who was forced to remove her prosthetic insert. While acknowledging public concerns about the pat-downs, Pistole again insisted that there would be no changes in the current procedures and called instead for public cooperation and understanding.
But Pistole said that current intelligence does not support the threat of bombs being placed in body cavities, and he disputed reports that an al-Qaida-linked terrorist last year used a bomb placed inside his rectum in an unsuccessful attempt to kill Saudi Prince Mohammed Bin Nayef. Pistole, a longtime veteran of the FBI, said reports that Abdullah Asieri had secreted the bomb inside a body cavity were "inaccurate" and not supported by the forensics he had seen.
"There is a stronger indication in findings that it was actually a Abdulmutallab-type underwear [bomb] ... strapped to the upper thigh, as opposed to being [in] a body cavity," Pistole said.
Even if terrorists did resort to cavity-type bombs, Pistole said that current screening procedures would be able to pick them up because it would require a device outside the body to initiate the explosion. "That's what the [Advanced Imaging Technology] machines pick up," he said.
Pistole acknowledged the concern, however, that many of the devices that could be used to initiate an explosion, such as a cell phone, might not immediately draw suspicion, even if spotted by screeners.
"We are taking some risk by not doing any screening [of body cavities], but it is the balance of what is the appropriate level of risk versus screening," he said.