‘The job kills any life really’: secrets of a UK airport security officer

theguardian.com:

Antisocial work hours, long days on your feet, and dealing with impatient and sometimes unpleasant passengers. Such is the life of an airport security officer.

Their role is to check passengers and their luggage before boarding, and they are key to ensuring safety and the smooth running of an airport. But the work is not well paid, and airports are struggling to recruit enough people to staff the X-ray machines and metal detectors as air travel rebounds after Covid.

As airports get busier and the queues to get through security get longer, those on the frontline are under stress.

Now a security officer who has worked for several years in the terminal at Stansted airport, located north-east of London, has come forward to share the behind-the-scenes realities of the job. The Guardian is protecting his identity because this is his only employment.

He currently works two long shifts a week, mostly at the weekends, with very early starts to manage the morning peak departure times.

“They can’t seem to keep people. But it is difficult work. Generally we start work at 4am, so getting up at 2am to get yourself into work is a killer. Of course you have to go to sleep early, so it kills any life really,” the man, who is in his 50s, told the Guardian.

He earns £14 an hour and takes home about £1,200 a month.

Working in a team, a group of colleagues are based around an X-ray machine. Passengers are greeted and then asked to take their belongings out of their pockets, to put them and their bags into a plastic tray to be screened.

The passengers pass through a metal detector and if required, they are searched.

Each security officer is only allowed to sit at the X-ray machine, monitoring the screen for a maximum of 20 minutes. Yet this is often