[Leica] The Times Have Changed

[tedgrant at shaw.ca (Ted Grant)]

Tom Schofield OFFERED:
Subject: Re: [Leica] The Times Have Changed

>>I even put a roll or two of P3200 in the baggie to satisfy them when they 
>>get grumpy and ask if I have
> film over ISO 800.  They're pretty surprised I do. <,,,,,

Hi Tom,
And then the guy says to me, 'Well take them out and we'll send the rest 
through the scanner!" Surprise and that's another one. They hand checked the 
3200's like they were gold with swabs, visual inspection back and forth end 
over end. I figured the next move was going to be to pry the caps off and 
look inside. :-(


>I usually unload the cameras, put the film in a zip-lock bag, and let them 
>x-ray the camera bag to their heart's content.  I can always reload on the 
>plane if I want to take pics out the window.  <,,,

You know it's like I've given up, as it's easier to join 'em to think you 
can beat them. "What the hell, who cares, do your thing!" I've had loaded 
cameras go through with the ASA dial set to 800 then gone onto the shoot, 
used it and not a mark even when the film was souped for 800!  So I look at 
it as, "KISS it baby.!" .. Apart from the very odd time I have 3200 or film 
up-rated and used at 3200, I just throw it all down on the table and let 
them do their thing!

And when I have film in freezer bags I take that out and put it down and let 
them make-up their own minds what to do. I found often they'll say, "We'll 
have a look at this over here." And walk away and when you've cleared the 
machine the person with your film bags is waiting for you to come over while 
they spend 20 minutes swabbing every individual roll. And by swabbing every 
roll, once again illustrates they're poorly trained. Simply because sticking 
the swab in the bag once and shaking it up, not to forget it's been well 
shaken during your trip to the airport, therefore any "explosive materials" 
would've permeated the entire bag before you arrive at the security point.

So it's a complete wasting of time and effort to scan each roll individually 
because if there's one roll in a bag of 50 rolls with bad stuff, it'll show 
up as soon as the first swab goes in the bag!.

> But since 9/11 they seem to retaliate for requesting hand-inspection of 
> even the film baggie by putting the rest of me through the detailed search 
> 3 times.  Last time I used an old baggie which registered on the nitrate 
> sniffer, so they re-sniffed each film can individually, and entered me 
> into their database. I can't wait till the next time I fly. 
> ;-)<<<<<<<<<,

Well yes it's strange what they do at one location compared to another. 
However, at times they know something the travelling public do not, so 
they're looking for something special even though at times security appears 
being run by the nation's rejected morons of the world, it isn't at all. As 
it comes down to they're doing the best job they can under unfortunate 
circumstances. So we could all give them a break and just learn to live with 
the facts of security life and KISS it!

ted