Austin, TX + TSA + Rig + Cypress = No carry on

[flyer299 0]

My wife and I traveled for thanksgiving to see family. Figured we would take the rigs and get some jumps in while in Florida. (Thanks Sebastian, had a great time!). This is our story of the TSA at Austin, Airport.

Our rigs have cypres in them.

I wanted to carry our rigs on so I could keep an eye on them. We are flying out of Austin, TX to Orlando, FL. Got to TSA, and the 1st guy who helped get the items into the XRay seemed very cool and asked us a little about skydiving. Then the Scanner stoped the belt and called over the supervisor. Well, short story is they told us we had to check the rigs. When I asked why, he responded with:

"You have an explosive charge in them"

I say, "The USPA has worked with the TSA to declare a cypress as a non-hazardous device that can be carried on a plane". I am figuring that he is going to keep on the explosive charge line, but this is where he takes a left turn.

He tells me that since the reserve pilot chute has a spring in it, that it makes it a hazzard. In the case of an emergency, if the reserve activated, it would "pop" out and be in the way of people getting out of the plane. Seeing that this was going no where, I ask for his supervisor. He comes over and basically says the same thing and tells us we have to check the bag so our evil reserve pilot chutes don't cause any problems.

So back to the counter we go and we check the bags. The TSA guy at the checked baggage seems to know what they are and how to deal with them. I stand there until they scan the rigs and clear them. No problems, rigs arrive in FL just fine.

On the way back, I try to carry the same rigs on the plane again, this time at Orlando, Fl. It took us about 5 extra minutes to get through security. A supervisor is called over. This time I had a card printed by Southwest Airlines that states a Cypress in a rig is allowed. The supervisor takes the card, my cypress card and the rigs to a x-Ray not in use. Does the explosive test thing on them, hands them to us and says, "Have a nice Flight". The whole time the TSA people in Orlando were very freindly, while the folks in Austin were on the rude side.

Anyways, I wanted to share with you what happened. I am thinking of contacting the TSA at Austin and showing them some of the documentation that I've seen between the TSA and USPA. Does anyone have any advice or URL's of this documentation?

Thanks
Ken

[PhreeZone 20]

Did you get the names of the people at the Austin Airport? I'm sure Ed Scott at USPA would love to hear your story and have thier names.

Yesterday is history
And tomorrow is a mystery

Parachutemanuals.com

[rdesilets 0]

Thanks for taking the time to post this. I recently moved to Austin (2 weeks ago) from the New England. Next wed. I am heading to a big way camp in Perris and I will be flying soutwest out of Austin. I am planning on taking my rig as carry on.

Was your rig not in a gear bag? I would find it hard to believe that if the rig was in a zipped gear bag the spring loaded pilot chute, even if activated, could do much harm.

I have flown from Hartford to/from Orlando and each time the experience was similar to yours in Orlando -- just a quick look and a 'have a nice flight'...

[newshooter12 0]

i know there are quite a few discussions here that a quick search may pull up...
Some results from elswhere:
USPA suggestions
TSA suggestions
Cypres suggestions
hope that gets you started.
matt

[sundevil777 102]

Quote

1st guy who helped get the items into the XRay seemed very cool and asked us a little about skydiving

Sounds like they were not in a bag. You open yourself up to much more hassle that way.

Please confirm if they were bagged or not.

People are sick and tired of being told that ordinary and decent people are fed up in this country with being sick and tired. I’m certainly not, and I’m sick and tired of being told that I am

[flyer299 0]

They were not in a gear bag and I belive that 2 things that would help a lot would be:

1) Gear Bag
2) Rig with out Cypress

I didn't have any gear bags that would still be considered carry on, so I opted for the over the shoulder way. Think I will invest in the bags before my next trip.

[GravityGirl 0]

My husband and I have traveled all over the world with our rigs.

Each airport has it's own flavor depending who the TSA supervisor is.

What we found is to go with the flow and be prepared.

My husband is an airline pilot and was trying to carry his rig on in Oakland International. TSA told him he had to check it. He asked them to show him documentation supporting their request and they threatened to call OPD on him. In uniform no less.

So again, be prepaired to check it if need be and go with the flow. The lower profile the better.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Peace and Blue Skies!
Bonnie ==>Gravity Gear!

[flyer299 0]

Thanks for the links. I sent an email to Betsy McStay at USPA per the instructions on the USPA site. I will be sure to post the results of this. I hope that I can aid the USPA in making Austin an easier place to travel with a rig.

[newshooter12 0]

your welcome. it'll be interesting to see what if anything will happen, but i agree with the keeping a low profile.
matt

[flyer299 0]

Yeah, I wasn't about to make it a big deal while in front of the TSA guys. I basically asked for a complete explaination and a chance to say my peace as to why I thought they were save to take on the plane...

But when TSA wanted me to check them, I knew that then wasn't the time to make them change their minds... Hope I can do something now...

I think Bon has it right, you have to be prepared to go with the flow.

[ZoneRat 0]

I had a boss that told me a story when he learned I started skydiving. When he was in college some 30 years ago he and a room-mate stole a military rig. They got drunk in the dorm room one night and deployed it. He said that the spring loaded deploy not only flew across the room hard enough to dent the wall, but that the parachute literally engulfed the room.

Now, I don't know anything about old military rigs. There are those here that do, and I defer to their judgement, but that's the story my old boss told.

It may be that the supervisor had a similar antiquated theory about what parachutes were like, and that's why he thought he was doing the right thing. In his minds eye he may have felt that the reserve, if deployed, would engulf the cabin in nylon (or silk).

Like many folk, he felt he knew better than his superiors about the dangers of parachutes on aircraft. (What you dont know that you don't know... that's what gets ya).

When I was leaving Orlando after nationals I had to talk to a supervisor about my carry-on rig. The x-ray guy thought that the cypress worked by means of compressed gas. I played stupid. I didn't want to tell him that no, its actually a small explosive charge.

I had a printout of the USPA guidlines as well as a copy of the letter of approval with me. I didn't have to show the letter, but the supervisor was impressed when I told him the exact number of the directive that said that rigs are ok. I'd highlighted that in the guidelines in case there was a problem.

Had I been really on top of things , I'd had a cypress card with me... (but I bought the cypress used and was too lazy to get one from airtec).

In any case, he found and read the directive. They did a swab of the rig, handed it back and said have a nice flight.

It would do us all a favor if you'd send your story info to the USPA. The TSA needs to know that their employees are still making needless mistakes.

“There are more things in Heaven and Earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophies.”

[beej 0]

security made me pull my reserve cos they were suspicious over the coil spring used in the pop top
.this was back in 99 at ohare...you can imagine the mess i was in..trying to stuff it all back in!

----------------------------------------------------
If the shit fits - wear it (blues brothers)--

[FrogNog 1]

The reason I would NEVER want to have my rig (when I own one) moved as checked luggage is because the specification for checked luggage says it is normal/expected/acceptable for the luggage to experience something like a 15 foot fall onto concrete (or tarmac or whatever), if it slips off the conveyor belt. I forget where I read this, but I think it was at the airport, and it was basically a specification saying "if your luggage can't tolerate this, you don't want to check it."

I was told never to drop a rig with an electronic AAD because their internals could be damaged by the acceleration. I'm sure a couple dozen gravities wouldn't break anything, but it does seem reasonable that a hundred or several hundred gravities could break something delicate inside that little black box. And depending how the rig lands, the AAD could end up with such an insane acceleration. (It mostly has to do with whether hard things hit; some electronics datasheets note that dropping a plastic-case transistor onto a workbench from a height of a foot can cause hundreds of gravities of acceleration and break stuff.)

When I have something the size of a backpack that cost me $3,500 and that has a delicate electronic voodoo backup component (comprising 25% of the cost) that I want to be fully operational in case I need it to save my life, I don't plan on letting luggage-tossers handle it.

If it were inside a gear bag with a huge foam wrapper around the entire rig, I would consider it.

-=-=-=-=-
Pull.

[FrogNog 1]

Quote

In the case of an emergency, if the reserve activated, it would "pop" out and be in the way of people getting out of the plane.

I know it would get you nowhere, or even a long ways backwards, but this makes me want to explain that, "yes, as skydivers we know unintended reserve deployments are no good and, in fact, they can cause personal or group injury or death in the normal situations we use our rigs, and we do our best to avoid this happening."

With the rig off my back I could see an increased possibility of some numb-nuts using the reserve handle to grab the rig, so that's a nice reason to stick it in a bag of some sort. Double-benefit: keep ignorant hands away and keep the pilot chute restrained if, by some unforseen accident, the reserve pin should clear.

-=-=-=-=-
Pull.

[jumperconway 0]

Several friends flew SWA from Austin for the POPs world record to Ontario,Ca. no problem either way. from Hou. I've flown SWA carry on no problem. I did tke the letters with me just in case, no one needed them but said thanks for being prepaired.