Response to "TSA Agents Took My Son"

A blog post has been circulating today from a woman who wrote a very emotional story about being separated from her child while traveling through a TSA check point. Two things went through my mind after reading her post.

1. As a father of two small children, I empathized with her about the alleged circumstances.
2. As a TSA employee and former TSO, I felt it could not be true -- especially since our policy is that TSA will not ask parents to do anything that would distance them from their children during the screening process.

TSA works daily to achieve the balance of effective security and passenger convenience. We diligently review claims of improper conduct. But when inaccurate passenger accounts are made either via media outlets or on the blogs, TSA works to resolve them and present both sides of the story. In this case, TSA has made the decision to post the CCTV video of the incident online to allow for transparency.

After watching the video footage, you'll see the video clearly shows that this individual was never separated from her baby by TSA. You'll also see that a lot of the other claims are also unfounded.

Blogger Bob
TSA Blog Team

***Update - 10/18/09 - 7:00 PM***

On Friday, TSA posted the video footage pertaining to the portion of the process where the individual said that TSA removed her child from her presence. There are 9 camera angles of the incident which were placed into sequence to show the time frame in question. For full transparency, TSA is posting the entirety of the footage from each camera of the entire time the passenger was within camera range at the checkpoint.

Part 1 - Entering Checkpoint

Part 2 - Loading Items on X-ray

Part 3 - Waiting to be Screened (Different Angle)

Part 4 - Waiting to be Screened

Part 5 - Walking to Screening Area

Part 6 - Security Screening

Part 7 - Security Screening (Different Angle)

Part 8 - Exiting Checkpoint

Part 9 - Exiting Checkpoint (Different Angle)

Also, TSA's Atlanta Federal Security Director and the TSA blog team reached out to the individual on behalf of TSA on more than one occasion regarding the incident and have not heard back.

The individual has also acknowledged on her blog that this is her in our CCTV footage.

Thanks ~ Blogger Bob