So to cut down the queues, airports are now introducing what could be described as procedures to optimise the workflow, based on the Smart Security System developed by IATA. In London’s Gatwick Airport, for example, passengers are now guided to form several queues at each X-ray machine’s conveyor belt. It makes the process of picking apart one’s luggage much more efficient. On the other side of the security check, meanwhile, passengers are offered numerous desks to repack their stuff, with dividers offering a semblance of privacy.

Amsterdam’s Schiphol airport uses a similar system to load the trays and cut down the queues, while a new auto scan system performs an initial assessment of the content of the tray, and shows the operator an image only when it spots a suspicious item. “This means fewer images [to check], allowing the operator to concentrate on the images that do require attention,” says Louwerse. Hand luggage that needs a second check is then split from the stream of approved trays, and goes through another X-ray machine at the end of the lane. “Baggage no longer needs to be returned to the X-ray in the lane, which saves time and is much more practical,” says Louwerse.

The system is part of the Schiphol Security Experience initiative, which tries to provide security as a service, not a cumbersome necessity. Schiphol also will end its practice of having security checks right in front of each gate, and introduce instead – from June this year – a more conventional centralised security checkpoint. The airport hopes that this will end its notorious, snail-pace queues.

MRI for luggage

But it’s not just about making security faster; Schiphol’s new security areas have been designed to radiate calm, with plants, noise-reducing materials, wood-covered ceiling and more natural light. Security staff, meanwhile, had to go through a retraining, learning not just security but hospitality as well, says Louwerse.

And scanner technology may soon help after all, says IATA’s Goater: “In time, liquid and laptop scanners will hopefully enable people to keep these items in the luggage.”

Researchers believe they may already have a solution. Scientists at Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico, for instance, have come up with a system called MagRay, based on the scanning technology developed for medical applications – a combination of X-rays and nuclear magnetic resonance, which is used in MRI scans. “We combine the two methods to discriminate benign from threat liquids,” says Michelle Espy, a physicist at Los Alamos and MagRay’s project leader. Trials at Albuquerque airport were “favourably received by screeners,” she adds – although the project has run out of funding for now.