I have never used one of those contactless cards or the option to use it even though I think my card qualifies. Seems like if your card is emitting something that makes that work would make it even easier to skim though. Maybe I am too concerned about things like this.
The good news is that almost all the people I know that have had their cards "eaten" have gotten them back... it just took a bit of work.
You still have to enter your pin into the machine, but yeah there is that option of something scanning it.
That's never happened to me, but the thing I hate is getting a new card and then seeing it come back out scratched like crazy.