[CQ-Contest] Carrying rig on airliner ?

[Gary A. Nieborsky PE]

Trey speaketh sage words of truth!  While waiting in Carracas (YV-land) for
the plane to Bogota (HK-land) I was hauled off at gun point to confirm the
contents of all the bags we had checked in Seattle.  In the luggage was my
trusty IC2AT.  The officials there would not have let it continue on
unless:

1. It made noise (good thing they didn't want it to light up!),
2. I had a copy of my FCC document authorizing me to have it in my
posession (seems some countries only allow 2-way gear to be in the
posession of officially licensed folks).

I had similar conversations in Bogota, Quito and believe it or not the US
Customs folks at Concourse C in Miami.

73 Gary K7FR

----------
> From: Trey Garlough <trey at kkn.net>
> To: Nace_Steve_SC2720 at satgate.sat.mot.com
> Cc: cq-contest at contesting.com
> Subject: Re: [CQ-Contest] Carrying rig on airliner ?
> Date: Thursday, January 15, 1998 22:33 PM
> 
> > I need advice on the preferred method to haul my TS 850 on a
> > trip. Naturally I wish to treat it as a carry-on item. Can I wrap it
> > in protective material without any grief? Also, is it necessary to
> > carry any proof of ownership (sales receipt) to prove it is mine? My
> > destination is Canada.
> 
> When I toted my TS-850 to Ecuador in November I wrapped it in a bunch
> of bubble pack and put it in my giant Samsonite suitcase (most
> recently described on this mailing list by N6ZZ), along with my
> clothes and a bunch of other stuff.  Worked great!
> 
> Turns out the 850 fits very nicely into the type of canvas handbag you
> use for toting groceries and that you might receive as a freebee at a
> computer geek expo like InterOp or MacWorld.  I found this to be a
> nice way to carry the 850 as hand-baggage once on a US-to-US trip.
> 
> In my experience the greatest risk (by far) with carrying your rig as
> hand-baggage is the "low bid" airport security people at the security
> checkpoints with the x-ray machines.  I always carry a copy of my
> radio license with me.  Because it's is an "official government
> document" complete with US government seals and stuff, I find that it
> is often effective in dazzling these people.
> 
> If you can't persuade these people to let you pass the checkpoint with
> your radio, then you are hosed.  It seems that they are trained to
> "make sure the electronic device" works (if they can be bothered)
> before permitting it past the checkpoint, which to these people means
> "THE FRONT PANEL LIGHTS UP."  The moral of the story is that if you
> want to hand carry a rig, then 1) bring the power cord in your hand
> baggage, 2) bring a power supply (if necessary, like with the 850) in
> your hand baggage,and 3) if your TS-850 is really an empty shell with
> a bomb inside, make sure THE FRONT PANEL LIGHTS UP.  Either that or
> check the bomb in with the rest of your checked bags, because it
> doesn't seem to matter to the people who scan those bags whether or
> not THE FRONT PANEL LIGHTS UP.
> 
> What you don't want is to find yourself at some podunk airport with
> only one security checkpoint (i.e. single point of failure) where the
> security person decides you aren't going to carry your rig past their
> checkpoint.  And at which third-world hell-hole airport did I recently
> have this experience?  Miami International, Concourse C, with a dead
> TS-930 that I was trying to carry home.
> 
> "It doesn't matter that you are a transit passenger and that the last
> n security checkpoints in the last n airpots you have just come
> through permitted you to carry your radio.  That was then, this is
> now, and I have the intelligence of a potted plant.  And so does my
> supervisor."
> 
> The rest of the Miami story is that I hussled around with my 930 under
> arm until I could find an American Airlines "Customer Service Manager"
> (this is a trick in itself), who turned out to be fantastic.
> 
> AA: Can you turn the radio on?
> KO: Yes, but it's broken.  It doesn't work.
> AA: But DOES IT LIGHT UP?    
>      (you see, she understands how these people think!)
> KO: Sure, but I didn't bring a power cable because the radio is broken.
> AA: What kind of power cable do you need?
> KO: The world's most common power cable for computers, such as with
>     every computer and monitor in this building.
> AA: Ahh.
> 
> The AA supervisor, and the supervisor of the potted plant, and the 930
> and I took a walk over to gate C-1, where the AA supervisor (I'm not
> making this up!) yanks the power cable out of the SABRE comptuer at
> the gate and plugs it into the dead 930 (dead, except for the
> frequency display), at which point the security supervisor nods her
> head in approval and walks away.  IT LIGHTS UP, THEREFORE IT MUST BE
> SAFE TO CARRY ON AN AIRPLANE!
> 
> --Trey, N5KO
> 
> PS: Another hint about hand-carrying anything that's fragile: take a
> look at what's at the other end of the 3ft-high conveyor belt that
> will be sending your valuables through the X-ray machine and make a
> plan.  This is especially important if you need to get to the end of
> the conveyor before your valuables, like in HC2 where all parcels are
> immediately dismissed from the conveyor into a heap on the floor upon
> exit from the x-ray machine.
> 
> 
> --
> CQ-Contest on WWW:        http://www.contesting.com/_cq-contest/
> Administrative requests:  cq-contest-REQUEST at contesting.com


--
CQ-Contest on WWW:        http://www.contesting.com/_cq-contest/
Administrative requests:  cq-contest-REQUEST at contesting.com