TSA Woes

Tomorrow is my husband Tom’s birthday and we are headed to Vegas to celebrate. Trips to the airport are always challenging for Tom and me because we have to be hand searched before we can board a plane. There are never enough TSA agents to perform the manual screenings so even if we get to the airport two hours early. We often have to wait over an hour before we can get checked. More than once we’ve almost missed our flight because the TSA is understaffed.

Anyone with a disability will tell you that the manual pat downs are extremely intrusive and uncomfortable. TSA agents have the responsibility to make sure that no one is carrying a anything dangerous or illegal on board a plane, but it is an awful experience to be “Felt up” buy a perfect stranger in public!

The government shutdown has been going on for over a month now and many TSA agents are calling in sick because they don’t have the money to get to work. As a result, the security lines at LAX are over two hours long for able-bodied passengers. Tom and I canceled our flight to Vegas tomorrow because we realized that we could probably drive there faster than we could fly if we factor in the wait time in the security line.

There are countless reasons why the government shutdown needs to be resolved, we as Americans are increasingly unsafe because there are fewer TSA agents, fewer FDA agents, and fewer air traffic controllers just to name a few governmental agencies and services that are negatively impacted. 800,000 people are about to miss another paycheck, people are suffering. Something must be done. 

While Tom and I are driving to Las Vegas tomorrow I think I’m going to get on the phone with my senators and representatives to let them know that they need to get up off their butts and make an agreement to reopen our government NOW.