I have a prosthetic leg and travel weekly. Apparently, the TSA's official policy is (or at least was) that, if asked my me if I am allowed to remove my leg and

I have a prosthetic leg and travel weekly. Apparently, the TSA's official policy is (or at least was) that, if asked my me if I am allowed to remove my leg and place it on the x-ray conveyor belt, they are to tell me doing so is forbidden. However, if I simply do so, they are not to stop me. I presume the theory to be that travelers might somehow mis-understand and create a PR disaster by claiming that an amputee was forced to remove his leg. If I leave my leg on and walk through the metal detector, I must wait around until a male agent is available to swab me, check for explosive residue, and determine that I am not carrying a weapon. It's much more efficient to take the leg off and waddle on my knees through the metal detector. Most of the TSA agents know me at this point, but occasionally a new person will be caught off guard. Usually, they are speechless in fear of breaking two seemingly conflicting rules: (1) don't offend, humiliate, etc. and (2) don't allow passengers to do stuff they aren't supposed to do. I see some panicked motioning to a supervisor and hear, "Oh, he comes through here all the time! ...Yes, it's allowed." Occasionally, a new agent will tell me, "You can't do that, sir!" When I reply that I've done so well over a hundred times in the past couple years, they defer to a supervisor who informs them of my "rights." [Quotes to convey the absurdity of the situation, of course.] It is because of my experiences in hearing TSA agents make-up a rule out of thin air that I do not doubt the author of the blog posting. Interestingly, I suspect that my notoriety actually has lead to less scrutiny over time -- the frequency at which my carry-ons are hand inspected has decreased over time.