Friday, April 8, 2011

Overdose or overdo? Doused and scanned for radiation

Whenever you travel, you're sure to carry away some memorable experiences.

I had to walk through a radiation scanner on my visit to Taipei last week. The experience was both nerve-wracking and ridiculous.  This is the kind of thing that makes people unnecessarily worried  (Just ask the UN).  Passengers arriving from Japan were sequestered off for a special check.  The scanner was brown and resembled a thin, lanky doorframe. There were two or three officials wearing masks sitting at a table to one side of the scanner watching to see whether those who passed triggered a red or green light.

I didn't get a chance to take a picture, but I was able to find a video of the scene in Taipei:



There's also this news report.  Of course, everyone who passed through the brown gate triggered the green light. Who knows what the Kafka-esque red light is supposed to indicate...

I think my largest dose of radiation in all of this came from the airport (a trip through the metal detector and round-trip flight.

There was one other odd detail about my flight into Taipei (departure and arrival): a large swatch of translucent blue tape (sticky side up) was set upon the floor of the jet bridge in the space directly before entering the aircraft.  The edges were taped down and the size was so large that you couldn't leap over it without a running start.  At first glance it was kind of comical, but my paranoid brain told me, "You've never had to do this before.  Is this something related to the radiation scare?"  It was sort of like flypaper for humans.  It pulled at your feet as you treaded over it.

Maybe this is just a China Airlines thing, but why both before boarding the aircraft and again when exiting?  Perhaps the strange, sticky tape trap was designed to collect radioactive dust, rather than have it being left aboard like a peanut wrapper tucked into the seat crevice.  Unfortunately for the airlines, if there really is radioactive dust on your shoes, there's probably dust in/on your clothes.  I wonder if those HEPA filters used on aircraft would collect that sort of airborne dust?  How often are those changed, anyway?

The scanning reminded me (ironically) of a similar experience...
In May 2009, I visited Japan during the swine flu scare.   I remember when I landed at Kansai International, a group of Japanese medical personnel boarded my plane clad in goggles, masks, yellow, hooded jumpsuits to screen passengers for elevated body temperatures.   The whole thing was surreal--like some cross between Predator and The Hot Zone.  Two rows behind me, someone was found with an elevated temperature, so half of the plane was quarantined (probably for ten days).

The ordeal didn't end at the airport, either.  Throughout my trip, I was pestered with calls from the Board of Health, as my flight had originated in Huntsville, AL, where there had been several confirmed cases of swine flu in the week leading up to my trip.

Traveling is always an adventure.

1 comment:

  1. Apparently a lot of places in Asia are doing things like this. It really seems to scare a lot of the people involved.

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