Transporting gear on a commerial flight

[BMFin 0]

Yes.. thanks for backing me up. That being said, most likely you will have problems in any other country than the US. Not because its forbidden there, but because there are no rules about it and the screeners are confused about the issue.

Good luck trying to explain the french screener, or his supervisor, the TSA rules when they know 2 or 3 words of english and couldnt care less about TSA rules even if they understood you..

Also The standard hand baggage weight is 10 kilos max. (some airlines have restricted it to 7 kilos) But it wont matter so much because screening at a big airport isnt airline specific, so the screeners wont know you are taking the flight offered by airlineX. Also you might exeed the max dimensions with your rig.

shropshire: Ryanair also has same rules. 1 piece of cabin baggage. It should weigh no more than 10kg and not exceed the maximum dimensions of 55cm x 40cm x 20cm. I think these restrictions are "the standard weight/size hand baggage restrictions" around the world. Im too lazy however to google this to confirm my statement..

[cjsitfly 0]

Hey everyone,

Thnaks for all your input. I walked right through security without any questions at all. This was Sacramento Airport, I'll post for Denver on my return. They did all gather around and view the machine as I passed through and a couple of them said, "he's going skydiving, I've always wanted to do that", of which I replied, "I can help you with that". They did however take my trusty wine corkscrew from my conputer bag............. bummer.

Chris

Chris

[speuci 0]

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xray card

What is an xray card, and more importantly, where does one get one for a cypres? (I bought my gear used)

[cjsitfly 0]

An x-ray card is simplt a small card that has a diagram of what a parachute with an AAD looks like when passed thru an xray machine. The card also has information on what the screener is actually looking at. You should be able to get one on line or thru your local equipment supplier. I got mine from Action Air at Skydance.

Thank

Chris

[LloydDobbler 2]

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Nitrates and glycerol are out there and it is easy to introduce these contaminates though no fault of your own giving off a false positive test. Glycerol is used in our soaps and shaving creams etc. I was using a rental car that could have had Nitrate contaminates introduced by a previous renter from golf clubs, fireworks or whatever. Who knows. If you don't want to wash your kitbag at least wipe the inside of it with a damp soapy cloth with unscented Tide and let it dry thouroughly. I'm not going to get into a discussion of the accuracy of these trace EDT machines cause it would serve no useful purpose to this discussion and would aid and abet people that choose to do us harm. We all want safety when we travel and a $75.00 repack was a small price to pay for that safety. I might also add that you can take your rig out of the kitbag and put it in one of the grey bins and run it seperately through the x-ray machine this might air it out a bit and help alleviate a false positive test.

Incidently, I gave the USPA the details of what happened and the steps that TSA advised me to do to alleviate the situation and they and I consider the case isolated and closed.

Chris

Hey, Chris - thanks for the detailed story. Good on you for not making a huge fuss about it...and more importantly, for taking the time to go back, do some research, and educate (both the TSA & us, by posting here).

Your post re: Nitrates and Glycerol reminded me of another issue I'd heard about from a jumper who was stopped at security - that certain types of grass fertilizer can lead to a false positive on EDT machines. Not sure if it's true (anyone care to verify?), but it stands to reason that if you biff a landing and slide it in on a freshly-fertilized landing area, or if you set your gearbag down on what looks like a harmless piece of grass, it might show up when being swabbed by the TSA.

(Anyone have any experience/knowledge/firsthand info on this?)

Signatures are the new black.

[Sangi 0]

I'm thinking of bringing my own gear from Lithuania to Scotland to jump and I will be flying Ryanair.

I will be putting my gear as simple baggage (not carry on since it exeeds maximum weight)...

My question is. They off course scan the baggage before loading it on the plane. When they do and when they will see my Vigil AAD, what will they do? I don't want them pulling out my rig thinking it's a bomb and then curiously pulling the cutaway and reserve handles... Should I explain about the AAD to the person whom I register at and give my baggage or what?

"Dream as you'll live forever, live as you'll die today." James Dean

[freakyrat 1]

Lloyd

The EOD guy mentioned this about off-airport landings, and biffing a landing like you mentioned and how he had one rig give off the presence of Nitrates and had to have the jumper open the reserve etc.

I didn't raise much a fuss at Hobby with any of the TSA guys or the EOD guy, but I really did not want to open the reserve and did everything the I could to talk him out of requiring me to open the reserve. The thing is I still got on the airplane with the contaminated kitbag and my rig with a loose reserve pilot chute against the contamination. There should be a cutoff in the level of contaminates that can be on things because of all these nitrates and glycerol being used in innnocent applications.

One question I failed to ask the TSA folks "is anyone wearing a pacemaker? I completely forgot about the magnetic riser covers as I brought my Micron to Houston. The only thing I will remember next time as I don't want anyone hurt.


Chris

[angrypeppers 1]

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What is an xray card, and more importantly, where does one get one for a cypres? (I bought my gear used)

Here's a copy of one...

Burn the land and boil the sea,
You can't take the sky from me.

[LloydDobbler 2]

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I didn't raise much a fuss at Hobby with any of the TSA guys or the EOD guy, but I really did not want to open the reserve and did everything the I could to talk him out of requiring me to open the reserve. The thing is I still got on the airplane with the contaminated kitbag and my rig with a loose reserve pilot chute against the contamination. There should be a cutoff in the level of contaminates that can be on things because of all these nitrates and glycerol being used in innnocent applications.

I wholeheartedly agree. I think they're operating under the 'better safe than sorry' principle, which makes sense, for the most part. Unfortunately for us (as opposed to most people), to give them access to what they need to see in the event of a false positive requires an expense. Not cool.

Re: making a fuss, no doubt! I would have argued it all the way to the top, and probably have been ticked off, too. I was more referring to the tone of your post, which was very thoughtful. So many people (myself included, probably) would come online just to gripe about it - it was refreshing to hear someone who seemed to have reconciled the unfortunate false positive with air safety.

Signatures are the new black.

[freakyrat 1]

Lloyd

I really appreciated your comments. Being a Vietnam era veteran also (Thailand Service- ATC) I along with most of my crew hung out with some of the EOD people so I knew where the guy was coming from and we had a conversation about our military backgrounds etc. so in all it turned out pretty well. I think when we travel just to be on the safe side we shoud wipe down our kitbags inside, wash our jumpsuits and maybe take a damp cloth with maybe a tiny amound of unscented tide liquid and just take a swipe across the sides of our rigs and let them air out to be on the safe side.

Thanks again

Chris.

[mdrejhon 8]

Hey Chris,

It's too bad that you were all inconvenienced by this, but glad that it wasn't anything worse: I hear the horror story of a rig being opened in an attempted inspection by baggage handlers, and the rig was all a dirty mess on the floor by the time it reached its destination... I'd rather go through what you experienced than to possibly lose my rig to possible damage.

I may be taking an extra risk with bringing the weight belt too in my carry on, since that's a 2nd suspicious item... (Although I do space out the inspections as much as possible by putting the rig on conveyer first, everything else such as laptop/wallet/etc in between, then the bag with the weightbelt last)

I'll have to make some really tough decisions on how to proceed with this, once I make my first overseas skydiving trip in a year or two...

[freakyrat 1]

Mark

I always pushed the bag with the weightbelt through first. It seems to distract then than they forget about the rig and I just get the rig and go. At least that's what I did before TSA.

How did the Spaceland stuff go?

[hackish 8]

Besides equipping yourself with all the knowledge and paperwork you can one other very good strategy is to show up very early for your flight.

I always bring a length of cypres cord with me just in case they want to open the reserve. This can help you to put stuff back together so you can minimize any chance of damage until you can bring it to your rigger for a repack. Not like I'd be allowed to bring a temp pin or a leverage device to properly close the rig but if they do open it it's really not the end of the world...

-Michael

[cjsitfly 0]

Hey All,

I breezed right through Denver (DIA) on the return. They did do an explosive test on my rig but it passed. Nonetheless, the post on nitrates is great to remember as I did biff my first landing and get some grass on the container (First high altitude landing, cut me some slack).
Thanks All,
Chris (CJ)

Chris