Too bad you were treated that rudely. In general, the TSA people have been
uniformly polite and professional to me - at El Paso, DFW, Indy, Wilmington
and Charlotte, Dayton. Swabbing the canisters is common, but always done
politely for me. No question that they would provide (as the regulations
REQUIRE) a hand check, on request. Probably wouldn't have done much good to
ask for the supervisor.
Likely to get worse now that they claim that the bad guys are planning
attacks using weapons disguised as, among other things, cameras.
Gary Edwards
www.peopleplacesflight.com
-----Original Message-----
From: owner-olympus@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:owner-olympus@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx]On Behalf Of R. Jackson
Sent: Monday, August 25, 2003 7:57 PM
To: olympus@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [OM] Film and airports/46mm Olympus cap?
Just got back from vacation.
A couple of things worth mentioning. First off, I had a really hard
time with getting my film hand-checked at SFO. They apparently took it
as a sign that I was a troublemaker and spent a good 15 minutes rifling
through all my stuff and seeing if a metal-detector baton could be used
for a colonoscopy tool on me. They rub each canister of film with a
swab and then put the swab in a sniffer to see if the film has been
exposed to explosives. The guy at SFO claimed that only 800 speed film
or higher would be damaged by the x-rays, so when he was hand-checking
my film he'd say, "Well, THIS roll isn't high-speed" and then swab it
and throw it with considerable force into a grey plastic bin while the
sniffer did its work. Meanwhile I was assuming the position with my
shoes off and my feet in the foot-shaped outlines. The hardware in my
left elbow repeatedly set off the wand and the stormtrooper tapped my
elbow with his index finger at one point and then tilted his head as if
listening for something. I said, "Elbow bomb? How would I *arm* it?"
OK, bad pun. No reaction, either, other than my pal sticking the wand
up between my legs again and then grabbing my dangly bits from behind
as if he were sizing up produce. Finally all my film had been thrown
into the bin and I was allowed to put my shoes back on and repack my
camera case. Fun.
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