CABL Forum - TSA / International Security

All this reading about TSA related stuff I had to post this. First of all THIS IS NOT POLITICAL OR RELIGIOUS IN NATURE. Just a first hand account of personal observations.

I used to fly very frequently for many years, at the highest point between 1995-1998. I have over 750,000 actual flying miles (not frequent fliers) and have been around the planet quite a few times...and yes, all related to cable tv.

Most of my flying was PRIOR to 9/11 and I have seen some pretty wild airport security stuff in some exotic places. Some was pretty state-of-the-art and some was like Mickey Mouse antics.

Being an American I was under the impression that ALL airports and flights required metal detectors. That is/was not the case then. I remember in Sao Paulo, BRAZIL the metal detectors were ONLY on international flights. My domestic flight was on a modern 737, you "just walked on" from the terminal seating...and there were ALL sorts of characters that were "questionable" boarding.

In Guadalajara, MEXICO they DO have the detectors, but when you arrive into the airport at customs you walk through one of 10 rows that each had a standard "street signal" (Green, Red, Yellow). You would push a button and if it lit green, you walked through with luggage...if it was red, they searched your bags by opening a zipper and lifting a shirt or two then closed it back.

In India (think it was Madras) on a domestic flight I remember them telling me to "be at the gate 30-minutes" prior to departure or I would not get on". You walk to the gate desk, show passport, ticket and they tag and take your luggage. If there are 100 people in line and a woman argues for 20-minutes, they ONLY allow 10-minutes of boarding...the last in line have to stay behind! When they take your luggage, you stand outside the plane and identify your luggage prior to boarding. After they load your luggage into the cargo hull only then they allow you to walk onto the plane. They had no metal detectors that I remember except in Bombay (Mumbai) and Calcutta. The only international airport in India was in Bombay and possibly New Deli, and the airports were not open 24-hours either! Had to fly to Calcutta the next day from a SECOND airport since NO domestic flights were allowed to leave from the international airport.

Venezuela also had a similar type setup. There was (I was told) second domestic airport in Caracus that was not international and this caused problems. Sao Paulo, Brazil also had two airports as well but I believe both accepted international/domestic flights.

The worse, believe it or not, airport to get into/through customs and immigration was in Montreal, Quebec...in my opinion. Next time I have to go there I will enter through Toronto and take a domestic flight! I had a bigger problem there then in Bogota, Colombia! That is just a sample of some places and all were an adventure.

Bottom line ALL countries do not treat airport security equally, and I do not know if it has changed after 9/11.

Prior to 9/11 in this country I remember vividly that a high percentage (90% or more guessing) of TSA employees that I saw were non-born American workers. Most had poor or heavily accented English and spoke another language to each other while searching my bags and viewing that scanner. Many had name tags that had middle-eastern names and some did not understand what I was saying without calling a supervisor who was close behind them. This was seen mostly in Los Angeles, Washington DC/Baltimore and other larger markets.

After 9/11 I noticed this did change some things. Same procedures for the most part and Mohammad was replaced by Michael and Abdul was replaced by Arnold. There are more Americans working behind the TSA names and the English is a more understood version as priorly seen. The cab drivers in the airports are another story. That is a SORE spot with me.

I had to take a flight from Mexico City to JFK in New York City. I arrived into JFK at about 1am and was waiting to get a taxi from the terminal to the Hilton that is less than a mile actual driving. I was on a Mexicana flight and was one of the few who were American born. This date sticks out because it was the day Princess Dianna was killed. Many flights were canceled from NY to the U.K. because of this. Anyways, ALL cab drivers wanted a minimum of $100 to take people from the terminal to the hotels. All drivers told me that I would not be able to get out of the airport unless I did this since they had the monopoly and other drivers were forbidden from picking up due to their contract. I ended up paying $80 to this one jerk because I did not want to fight and needed to get a 6:30am flight the next morning. While in his cab all I heard was non-stop "non-english" (and it WAS NOT SPANISH). Now when I fly to my home town (Buffalo), that has the same problem, I call ahead for a local cab to pick me up at "departures".

Bottom line, international we are forced to live by their rules. But we do have a choice about what cab we wanna take...lol.

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TSA / International Security