Quite a novelty to see airport staff with a sense of humour, so many of them look so sour. I have a pair of jeans on which the zip is inclined to slip if I take my belt off and I always dread this happening if I wear them to travel.

I always make sure my belt comes off easily when I travel.

.

As MilleMiglia has chosen to remove the post to which this post was originally a comment on, I have now removed mine as well because otherwise nobody would have understood what on earth I was talking about!

SM

Many years ago I was returning into the USA from a short driving vacation in Mexico. I was crossing at the point near Tijuana, driving a company car, and I was accompanied by my then partner.
At the US side of the crossing point they always punch in the car registrations to a computer.

They did that. Something seemed to happen in the little booth, and then, in no more than 30 seconds, my car was surrounded by four police cars, and they were getting out, guns drawn, and pointed at me! We were taken into a little hut, and made to wait - without any explanation.

Eventually I was allowed back to my car, they explained that in punching in the registration the cop had accidently transposed a couple of characters and the number resulting had been that of a stolen car.

It did get slightly worse though. My partner (born and bred, and lived in Yorkshire most of her life) has always looked very slightly Spanish - something in the distant genes. They kept her in the hut for another 15 minutes, and an American police officer proceeded to give her a test on English Geography - to ensure she wasn't lying and her passport wasn't forged!!

Since the officer himself actually knew virtually nil about UK geography, the "test" was actually a complete farce.

4 yrs ago, going through manchester airport security, was asked to remove my belt from cargo trousers, whci had alot of studs, alarm went of again

so they did a sweep of my trousers, now as I move my hands of my trousers, the trousers feel down, as my belt was the only thing holding them up, the security gard stopped what he was doing, and told me to move on

Oh gosh, I knew this question would pop up somewhere!
Just don't mention it to my Husband, he hasn't forgiven me yet!

I suffer terribly from acid indigestion, and nothing seems to get rid of it but bicarbonate of soda.
I couldn't possibly go abroad without it. (I don't even go down the shops without it).
Hubby kept telling me to leave it, we'll find some there, but I wasn't going to take the risk.
"I'll be riddled with heartburn" I kept telling him.

I thought I'd packed the tub carefully, but as they put my case onto the belt at check in,
a trail of white powder fell from it.
Well, you can guess the rest.
We were carted off to customs and kept there for 3 hours whilst the 'suspicious' powder was checked out.
We missed our flight, and had to fly the next day, losing a day of our holidays.
Well, he didn't speak to me for 3 days after that, and to cap it all off..........
I didn't get 'heartburn' once whilst we away!!!!

Ouch pandy.

Helen

Oh pandy - that did make me laugh! At least they didn't snap on the latex gloves though, eh?

Reminded me of the time we bought apple tea at the market in Turkey - didn't think anything of it at the time, but it was only while I was packing the cases to come home that I realised a plain plastic bag containing a brownish white powder might look just a wee bit suspicious....

That would be why I shoved it into hubby's case!

It wasn't funny at the time folks, but looking back on it now makes us howl.

Mind you we were living in Oz at the time, and I don't know if anyone's familiar with their
airport procedures, but they are really 'on the ball'.
I sometimes wish our British airports were as thorough though. I think far too much gets past our guys!!

Pandy I watch Nothing to Declare on TV and am amazed at the Australian customs.
They really are thorough arent they?
The things they find in peoples suitcase never ceases to amaze me,especially from Asia.

I know Jay trip, they never cease to amaze me with food items.
There are Chinese and Vietnamese supermarkets all
over Oz, but they still insist on bringing loads of food items
past customs when they enter Oz.

My son got his beaker taken from him and emptied as it contained diluted orange juice and not milk yet they failed to spot my bottle of water in my bag over their excitement at taking his drink off him!! They then emptied my husbands bag and started doing drug swabs in all the compartments!! I had to sit and breastfeed my son in full view of all the other passengers to calm him down when they finally let us go through there were women trying to get us to sign up for a credit card and I just totally lost it!!!!!!

I just returned from lido di jesolo, flying from marco polo to manchester airport, and both have there own stories

Fly out from manchester airport, everyone was asked to remove there belts, now as most of you will knwo, I have lost 2 stones in weight, so after removing my belt, my shorts fell down , much to the amusement of the people behind me, quickly pull my shorts up, the security guard who told me to remove my belt, had a slight giggle, and told me to go through the scanner

Well it bleeped, well it would, as my shorts have got metal studs in them, other security guard told me, I will be frisked, so could I raise my arms, asked if I can only raise one, which he said no, and when I raised both arms, well you can guess what happen next

Now my bag was x-rayed and no problems show up...now question, at marco polo airport, when my bag went through the x-ray machine, there was a big issue, and they wanted to know what was in my bag, on the x-ray it look very suspicious

Now all that was in my bag was, cables for charging, mp3 player, cameras, magnetic speakers, coins, and keys, I basically got the third degree for this, and as it turns out, it was the speakers, which were held together with magnets

Now because of this, they swapped my bag, my clothes, asked to remove my shoes, and once finished, was told to have a nice flight

Do the airports use the same equipment and get the same training, or does each airport have their own guidelines

Omg re shorts falling down - I hope you had a long T shirt on

Glynis HT Admin wrote:

Omg re shorts falling down - I hope you had a long T shirt on :yikes

If I wasnt wearing any underwear would I have got done for indecent exposure

Joe, I think most airports use the same sort of equipment, perhaps different makes. They would get similar training and the guidelines are mainly set by the EU .

One thing I really try to do when going through an airport is not to wear anything that is metal or has metal on it , I find this useful especially as I know I'm going through a metal detector , and that if I do alarm I'm going to frisked by a man Now if I'm with my mate at a football match I don't mind a little hug when we score , but in general , I'm not too comfortable being TOO close to another man If I was going to frisked by a female , I would be wearing more metal than that bloke who did Firestarter !!!
In fact I often get my missus to put on her uniform and ......

afraid this one isn't so funny
last year going through at manchester airport a young lad in front traveling with his friends had his wallet in his pocket, he was told to take it out and put it in container.They then searched him and by the time he got through his wallet had gone!!
I always warn my family now to put all valuables to the bottom of there hand luggage before they go through.
Jeanie

jeanie wrote:

afraid this one isn't so funny
last year going through at manchester airport a young lad in front traveling with his friends had his wallet in his pocket, he was told to take it out and put it in container.They then searched him and by the time he got through his wallet had gone!!
I always warn my family now to put all valuables to the bottom of there hand luggage before they go through.
Jeanie

jeanie

I think it would be simple enough to find who took the boys wallet, as they would have cctv, and the pesron who took should be on the cctv