Airport X-ray

[BrianShaw]

A couple of months ago at Mpls/StPaul...

(snip)

One of them set off her sniffer machine. It might have been the foild wrap - she couldn't reproduce the effect.

(snip)

The first woman looked very sheepish. The supervisor handed me my film and wished me a pleasant flight.

About a year ago at LAX...

I put my camera bag (F3, couple of lenses) on the conveyor and handed a bag of film to Mr. TSA. He handed the bag to Ms. TSA who looked at them and handed them to me. The camera bag was being held by another Ms. TSA who said "we're going to have to hand search this, okay?" So she snooped through the bag and then carried over to the trace detection and started swabbing the parts. One set off the alarm. She asked me to step back from the table while a TSA supervisor requested my ticket and ID. He smiled and asked a bunch of questions:

Are you a pro photog? Where are you going? Who do you work for? Are you a US citizen? When was the last time you handled explosives?

Then he disappeared with my ticket and ID. Ms. TSA kept one hand on my camera bag and smiled sheepishly. She said things like "this sometimes happens." Eventually the TSA supervisor returned with my ticket and ID. He smiles dheepishly and told me that everything "checked out". Then he helped Ms. TSA take EVERY BIT OF EQUIPMENT, including a few old film boxes out of the bag and swabbed each and every item. They were very methodical, very complete, and completely careful when handling my equipment.

After all of my stuff passed the test, Ms TSA smiled sheepishly and said "false alarms sometimes happen... now, how do you want your equipment organized" as she started packing my bag for me.

Ms. TSA then smiled sheepishly and wished me a pleasant flight. Total time: about 18 minutes. Not much of an inconvenience and they certainly were polite about it.

The sheepish smiles, however, are probably taught in TSA training courses!

 

[eric]

I have 3 initial test scans in the standard gallery

 

[epatsellis]

Interestingly, I flew into Victoria B.C. about 3 months ago, TSA was over accomodating, even with 100 rolls of NPS and 50 rolls of Velvia. When I got to Victoria Customs, that was another story. After 1 1/2 hours of questioning why I have 4 bodies, 26 lenses and a strobe pack/4 heads/stands and 2 gitzo tripods, they were satisfied with the answers. For a while, I was seriously thinking that it was going to be body cavity search time, though they were polite, just not too believing that in this day and age there are still people that shoot film. I was on an extended vacation and had planned on shooting several artisan types I had met the last time I was up there, mostly for their personal use. (note to self: rent lighting equipment next time and fedex yourself some of the bigger stuff up)

erie

 

[BrianShaw]

Ha, erie -- they weren't hassling you, nor were they debating film vs digital.. they were proably trying to figure out if they should turn you over to the revenue agent so you could pay some sort of tax!

So why did you have 4 camera bodies, 26 lenses, etc, etc? (just kidding)

 

[MattKing]

Interestingly, I flew into Victoria B.C. about 3 months ago, TSA was over accomodating, even with 100 rolls of NPS and 50 rolls of Velvia. When I got to Victoria Customs, that was another story. After 1 1/2 hours of questioning why I have 4 bodies, 26 lenses and a strobe pack/4 heads/stands and 2 gitzo tripods, they were satisfied with the answers. For a while, I was seriously thinking that it was going to be body cavity search time, though they were polite, just not too believing that in this day and age there are still people that shoot film. I was on an extended vacation and had planned on shooting several artisan types I had met the last time I was up there, mostly for their personal use. (note to self: rent lighting equipment next time and fedex yourself some of the bigger stuff up)

erie

Erie:

I am assuming that you are not a Canadian Citizen or permanent resident of Canada.

I don't think your choice of gear (film vs digital) was what triggered it. It was the apparent professional quality and quantity.

The Customs people in Canada are also immigration officers. If you are coming into Canada to work, there are formalities to comply with if you are residing somewhere (like the USA) where NAFTA applies, and VISAs to obtain, if you reside elsewhere.

Matt

 

[Maine-iac]

I just returned from a three-week trip to Ghana and Paris. Film went through scanners a total of five times, three of them after it had been exposed. I took hundreds of 35mm color (ASA 200) and lost only four prints (all of which I had similar "backup" shots for) due to fogging.

I stopped asking for hand inspections when the security folks in the Boston airport opened every single 120 box and foil inner packet on a trip where I was carrying about 25 rolls of 120. Almost missed my flight. So now I know. Five scans of exposed film is the limit with only a few partially fogged prints.

Larry

 

[roteague]

I suspect your fogging may have come from you stopover in Ghana. I've run Velvia 100 through the x-ray scanners as many as 7 times without any discernable effects.

 

[chiller]

I'm often sadly amused by the juvenile and very self obsessed comments of some people when confronted with the question of security checks through airports.

For the first time in my life I travelled internationally last year [I'm 52] and despite the fears I had regarding the loss of my film to xray I was a tad more concerned that someone not a photographer and with a desire to ruin my day may attempt to smuggle some harmful material on board my 14 hour flight from Australia to San Francisco. Consider if, through lacking security you or a member of your family was killed or injured.

I'm really concerned that fear has driven the need for these measures and I have to admit that I'm selfishly put out in a small manner by what now takes place, but, I accept them if I want to fly.

But consider the alternatives. Open slather with no checks and eventually no one wil fly.

I carried as hand luggage 3 rolls of the fillm I would be using in America and just let them go through security xray. 120 rolls of APX 100 and Acros.

I had arranged all of my film for use over the month to be sent from stores within the USA prior to my arrival.
On arrival my friend and I exposed a fresh roll of each film sent from on line stores to his home and a roll of each carried through xray to a grey card .

The film I had carried from Australia was older and a different emulsion batch but all films were treated the same. Each type was then processed together.

When measured on a densitometer there was little if any difference in the films. Luckily we had maked the zapped films as if we hadn't we would not have known which was which.

I kept one of the films and carried it back as hand luggage to Australia and conducted the same test. There was a very slight increase in base fog but absolutely nothing that could cause a concern. Also my test in australia was carried out with a different densitometer so that has to be considered as well.

I had some sheet film and just let it go through as well with no ill effects.

Oh and despite my telling my family that it was a once in a lifetime trip last year, I will be back in Yosemite, Bodie, Carmel, Death Valley Etc, etc , etc for another month in September this year. I'm concerned about travelling but film is the least of my worries.

Also a very good use for a digital is to photograph your bags as you pack them at various stages. I then seal my bags with cable ties. If a customs officer wants to open them then they can cut them. Hopefully it will deter "unofficial" eyes. Oh and another "tip" for international flights slip on shoes. Anyone who travels internationally will understand that one.

 

[Wigwam Jones]

I'm often sadly amused by the juvenile and very self obsessed comments of some people when confronted with the question of security checks through airports.

I understand your concerns. Very often, though, I am equally amused by those I hear speaking while we are in line, who say "They can do anything they like, I have nothing to hide." Or, alternatively, "I don't care how much they search as long as it makes us safe."

I have several comments on this. The first being that anyone who thinks they can trade civil rights for safety is not terribly aware that what they end up with is usually neither privacy nor safety. If the goal is safety, we can all quiver in fear in our homes while the National Guard stands on every doorstep and demands our papers when we enter or leave. Very safe. Is that what we want?

I, too, want airline flights to be safe. I don't know how things are done in Australia these days, but in the USA, we still have a number of issues with airport security. Not the least of which is that parcels sent as luggage by shippers is frequently not searched, scanned, or examined in any way. It is going in the same cargo hold where our checked luggage is going, but it has not been examined - the shipper instead has 'vouched' for it. See, there is no such thing as a little security. One either has security or one has not. We do not. I resent having the TSA put a probe up my jaxie to see what manner of lunch I had while Joe Blow Inc has sent eleventy dozen lumpy ticking packets of God-Knows-What via the same airplane without scrutiny of any kind.

This is not 'security', my friend. This is the appearance of security. And it is not there to make the flight safer, it is there to make us FEEL safer. Well, I don't, and I resent the intrusion when it serves no actual purpose.

We may have differing opinions, but please don't assume if you hear me carping about security and the need to dance in my socks and have my naughty rubber chicken fondled and paraded about by uniformed goons who lake even a high school education that I am just a selfish person who hates delays. I am a selfish person and I do hate delays, but there is more to the story than that.

I then seal my bags with cable ties. If a customs officer wants to open them then they can cut them. Hopefully it will deter "unofficial" eyes.

I used to do that as well, using wire twist ties. They could be removed without cutting. In the US, very often the airline would not allow the bag to be checked unless it was unlocked - including no cable ties. I don't think it deterred any would-be thieves, but it kept the zipper closed so that it didn't come open through handling and so forth.

Oh and another "tip" for international flights slip on shoes. Anyone who travels internationally will understand that one.

I also used to carry a pair of 'sport socks' that I slipped on over my street socks when I took my shoes off. That way, my socks did not get polluted with the vile contents of the stinking carpets that they force people to stand on while awaiting their probe. I took them off again when I put my shoes back on after security was done.

 

[eddym]

My wife just returned from a week with her family in Yellowstone. She did all the smart things: bought film there instead of carrying it on the plane; had it processed there instead of bringing it back undeveloped. Except for one roll of GC400 that was still in her camera when she flew home... It was in her hand luggage, so did not get the high dose machine, and only went through once, at the Jackson Hole airport. It was in her purse for the rest of the trip.

We picked the film up from the lab yesterday. Most of it is fine, but there is a large band of fog on the leader, then smaller ones (but large enough to ruin the negs) on frames #1 and #3, and then steadily diminishing fog until just on the film edge on odd frames up to #10. Again, this was 400 film with just one pass.

It struck me as odd that the fog begins at the beginning of the roll, which was still on the takeup spool, as she had shot up to frame 28 and not rewound. In other words, the worst fog was on the innermost part of the film. All I can think of is that the machine focuses the xray beam on the center of the object being scanned, and that focus point fell on the center of the camera, where the beginning of the film was against the takeup spool. The exposure is lighter with each turn of the film on the spool. Anyone who has ever opened the back of a camera before rewinding the film, then had it developed, will recognize the pattern. But in that case, the film is most fogged at the end of the roll, not at the beginning.

At any rate, I will no longer believe the "up to 5 passes is safe" claim.

 

[John Jarosz]

I just returned from Denver/Chicago. All I had was two boxes of Readyloads.

In Chicago, they opened the first box and looked at the film, as it was out of the inner foil wrap. The second box was sealed. They said they had to open it or x-ray it. I said to open it. When she got to the foil wrap, she just stopped and didn't know what to do. So she put it back in the box and gave it to me.

In Denver, the guy said he had never seen Readyloads before and asked what kind of camera it was for. He seperated each Readyload and looked at each one.

They completely dis-assembled my camera bag at O'Hare AFTER it was x-rayed. In Denver it went thru the x-ray with no pause or issue.

We may be a smaller minority than we think. I haven't traveled with 4x5 equipment by air since before 911. The inspector in Denver told me that the guidelines for personal thresholds are being reviewed and will get a lot tougher in the next month which will result in more more personal "pat-down" searches (his words). (Not sure what this has to do with film though, sorry)

John

 

[Wigwam Jones]

At any rate, I will no longer believe the "up to 5 passes is safe" claim.

The problem is that the TSA and most sources of information do not 'come clean' regarding damage. They use terms that weasel around and mislead with concepts like 'up to five passes will not damage your film.'

That's B.S., plain and simple. X-Rays damage undeveloped film. EVERY TIME.

The effect is cumulative. What they are TRYING to say is that up to five passes through the X-Ray scanner will produce damage that you most likely will not be able to detect. Not that it will not produce damage, just that you won't be able to notice it. Some would argue that if you can't detect it, it is not damage. I disagree. If it takes six passes before damage is detected, the sixth pass was no worse than the first five - so they ALL contributed to the damage.

Each and every X-Ray machine is calibrated, but they drift and some produce higher power scans than others. There are differences in brand and models as well. Likewise, I have been through metal detectors that I swear were detecting the iron in my blood, while others let me through with naughty metal things in my pockets.

So what I'm saying is that you may have been the recipient of an unlucky more powerful scanner, or your film may have suffered more damage by X-Rays bouncing around the inside of your camera instead of passing through a cardboard box; it would be hard to say.

The 'Five Passes' thing is a generality, and is usually fairly accurate in terms of rating exposure damage (even if they don't tell you it is cumulative). I've had film that I've taken through security far more times than that and I did not see any damage at all. Not that it was not there, just that I didn't see it.

Personally, I stopped sweating it, but I would still ask for hand-scan when I was going somewhere and planned to take some 'important to me' photos, like family photos and the like.

But overall, the whole TSA anal probe dance combined with the health effects of being overweight, smoking, and flying twice a week, 150,000 miles per year and eating fast food six days a week made me decide to pack in the road warrior gig. Now I hate the airport so much I refuse to fly if there is any possibility of getting there by train or car. Eh, end of rant.

I'm sorry your film got damaged to the point where you could see it. I know it may be small consolation, but it may have been luck of the draw.

 

[roteague]

But overall, the whole TSA anal probe dance combined with the health effects of being overweight, smoking, and flying twice a week, 150,000 miles per year and eating fast food six days a week made me decide to pack in the road warrior gig. Now I hate the airport so much I refuse to fly if there is any possibility of getting there by train or car. Eh, end of rant.

I can sympathize with you. If I lived on the mainland I would probably never fly. As it is, I do most of my flying these days outside the US.

 

[Wigwam Jones]

I can sympathize with you. If I lived on the mainland I would probably never fly. As it is, I do most of my flying these days outside the US.

I've actually found that Amtrak is a great way to go. I've had a few bad experiences, but overall it has been very positive. And no x-rays, no scanners, no shoes off - just show your ID and get on the danged train. Ah. Loverly.

 

[BrianShaw]

I resent having the TSA put a probe up my jaxie to see what manner of lunch I had ... and have my naughty rubber chicken fondled and paraded about by uniformed goons ...

TMI, my friend, TMI.

 

[Wigwam Jones]

TMI, my friend, TMI.

Always been my problem. I can never tell when enough is enough.

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It's a sick world, and I'm a happy guy.

 

[roteague]

Always been my problem. I can never tell when enough is enough.

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It's a sick world, and I'm a happy guy.

Hey, at least you aren't in cattle class with the rest of us.

 

[BrianShaw]

I needed a good laugh... thanks Bill!

 

[Wigwam Jones]

Hey, at least you aren't in cattle class with the rest of us.

Only because I flew so much, I have (edit: 'had') 'elite' status on a number of airlines and often got upgrades. When I flew overseas and didn't get free upgrades, I'd trade in bunches of airline miles for the upgrade. I did LAX to Beijing once in coach - never, never, never again.

 

[BrianShaw]

I did LAX to Beijing once in coach - never, never, never again.

Although... sometimes it works out okay. I flew Sidney to LA in coach. Both 1st class and Biz Class was jammed full. Six or seven of us shared the entire coach section. Lots of room to stretch out and very personalized service. food was crap (as usual) but that was okay.

 

[roteague]

Although... sometimes it works out okay. I flew Sidney to LA in coach. Both 1st class and Biz Class was jammed full. Six or seven of us shared the entire coach section. Lots of room to stretch out and very personalized service. food was crap (as usual) but that was okay.

I got lucky once on a flight from Honolulu to Sydney; some guy in First Class wanted to trade seats with me - I was in couch. Seems, I was sitting next to his wife. Great flight.

 

[DBP]

I got lucky once on a flight from Honolulu to Sydney; some guy in First Class wanted to trade seats with me - I was in couch. Seems, I was sitting next to his wife. Great flight.

Maybe the possibility of your getting lucky is why he wanted to switch?

 

[roteague]

Maybe the possibility of your getting lucky is why he wanted to switch?

I never thought of that

 

[eddym]

I can sympathize with you. If I lived on the mainland I would probably never fly. As it is, I do most of my flying these days outside the US.

Like you, I live on an island (Puerto Rico). I'd just as soon stay here all the time, but every now and then we do have to travel to the States for family matters or vacation. It's getting to where I dread it.

In September we're flying to Atlanta for my nephew's wedding, which I am shooting. Though it pains me deeply, I won't be shooting film, partly because of the hassle involved in flying with it.

 

[roteague]

In September we're flying to Atlanta for my nephew's wedding, which I am shooting. Though it pains me deeply, I won't be shooting film, partly because of the hassle involved in flying with it.

I know of at least one well known photographer - Colin Prior - who gives this as one of the reasons he switched to digital.