London Heathrow Airport in the UK is to test the Smiths Detection Sentinel II system to screen passengers for explosives. Passengers in the central search area of Heathrow's Terminal 1 will be randomly picked to pass through the portal. The device can detect tiny traces of explosives on a person or clothing within seconds, alerting staff with a warning.
The Sentinel system can screen up to 420 passengers an hour. Small bursts of air blown over them are drawn into the instrument for ion mobility spectrometry analysis.
Source: Flight International
