Obviously i wouldn't mind a woman giving me a good old frisk but i would certainly object if i was going through with my girlfriend and a male started a pat down on her.
Oh for gods sake binzer.
We're in the 21st century, how would you feel if you asked for a female to pat down your girlfriend and she was allocated a lesbian security officer ? A gay officer then proceeds to pat you down.
Look, its simple. You're at an airport, the people there have been heavily security vetted, the pat down is happening in a public area (unless you request differently) and there are CCTV cameras everywhere. Do you honestly think anyone is going to take advantage of that situation when there's enough evidence and witnesses around to allow the boss to be judge, jury and executioner in relation to the offending security officer without fear of retribution ?
so why is this the only airport i've seen do it, seems to be a reason why others dont do it.
You need to get out more.
I was travelling through Christchurch (NZ) recently and they were doing mixed-sex pat downs then too. Neither male or female passengers complained, and nobody was raped.
Pat downs need to happen for security reasons. Its a right pain in places like Heathrow when you get large queues forming because you have to wait for a same-sex officer to become available before you can walk through the metal detector because they are currently busy on a pat down on the previous same-sex person who set off the detector .... the security flow would be much quicker if mixed-sex pat downs were permitted.