Heathrow Airport review: Terrible treatment by security staff of elderly woman with medical issues

September 16, 2023, starting at approximately 10:15am. Terminal 2 Premium Security Gate

The Security team at the Premier/Gold security gate were the worst we've ever experienced and we've traveled close to 2 million miles around the world. We were appalled at not only the rude behavior of the entire group, especially to someone with stated major medical issues, but of the extremely poor management decision of a lower level supervisor. Please read on.

I'm in my late 60's with major medical implants that set off the security "doorway" at airports. My doctor advised me not to go through the larger, round device so I’m very familiar with body pat downs.

At around 10:15am on September 16th, my husband and I went to the Premier side of Security at Terminal 2 for our departure. After setting off the metal detector a young Caucasian man about 5'-7" with light brown hair, told me to go into the round device. I informed him that I couldn't and a pat down was fine. He didn't listen and insistently and not at all politely started demand that I to go through the second device again. I held up my hand to get a word in edgewise to tell him “no” again and he got all upset, raised his voice and kept saying "You interrupted me! You interrupted me" You interrupted me" (seriously, it was laughable if not a serious issue of less than adequate emotional maturity needed for his job). As a grandmotherly person, I calmly recommended that he calm down. He stomped off to tell his supervisor (a slender young woman with long thin blond hair). Throughout my interaction with him his demeanor was that of an immature, arrogant teenager, certainly not someone you’d expect to be working in a secure area of the airport! He returned to smugly give me a less-than-sincere apology and patronizingly pat me on the shoulder as he walked by. My husband watched the interaction between the two and told me later that it was clear by their body language and their smug looks at me when they were talking that something was going on and he realized I was the victim of “payback”, which is explained below.

The next act of this comedy/drama was three more security people (the third one was the young blond) coming up and trying to rudely bully me into going through the round Xray device. Each told me that I would have to have a full body pat down to which I said fine, that it happens all the time and I’m very familiar with the procedure. I was astonished that they felt it necessary to have four people waste their time when I was quite clear about my condition from the very first. The last and eldest supervisor (older woman with short grayish hair) acted as if I was stupid and didn’t understand my medical condition! She finally told the team to give me a pat down in a private room.

The slender blond lower-level supervisor greeted me when I left the room and escorted me over to the table at the end of the security section and told the staff member there to give me a “full layer” search (to his credit he looked quite surprised). This we learned involved taking everything out of every pocket, nook and cranny of my carryon items. The same supervisor then proceeded to dismiss all of the other staff in the Premium section, leaving the poor man alone while going through my bags with 12-15 very unhappy passengers waiting for their turn as he unloaded and inspected my stuff. To say they were upset would be putting it mildly and also concerned that they would be subject to the same procedure. After 15 minutes one woman started to justifiably freak out, worried that she’d miss her flight. I finally went over to where the blond supervisor was standing and chatting with a few people at the regular security area and told her of the problem. She finally came over and shifted some of the people to the regular security area.

Please know that the gentleman searching my bag was the only courteous, respectful staff member I encountered during this incident. He was also a man of color who was unfortunately stuck with doing the search, for which I’m sure he was worried he would receive complaints from me and the other passengers. We all knew that any ire should be towards the other, white staff, and were kind to him.

In sum, the security staff were rude, insensitive to the medical issues of an elderly person, and purposefully delayed well over a dozen passengers for their flights because of petty behavior and a poor management decision.