On traveling with a spike foot tripod

David Hall

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Howdy all...

I had created a post last week asking if I could carry on a Ries tripod with small spiked feet. The consensus seemed to be that it was probably a borderline thing with the TSA, and that it would be safer to just check it.

Well, I didn't. Not at first.

It turns out that the TSA has some rule about the length a point object can be, and tripod feet are longer.

It also turns out that when you are at security and they tell you something has to be checked instead of carried on, they don't just "gate check" it like oversize carry-ons. They make you go back to the ticket counter, and you have to stand in line to have your ticket modified.

Just FYI. Learning lessons the hardest, stoopidest possible way for the good of the forum...

dgh
 

FeS2

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Do that once or twice on international flights, and you'll never forget to "know before you go"...
 

GregY

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A "gate check" requires a claim ticket and a label on the item. I've been turned back for several items...including a 3.20 m, folding avalanche probe (40cm sections). Yet there's a lady sitting next to me on the plane with 12"+ knitting needles..... you tell me which is a security threat.
Last month on an international flight, i got through with a monopod with a spike
 

Sirius Glass

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I retract the spiked feet to be withdrawn into the rubber feet around them and I put the tripod in the suit case to be checked baggage.
 

gone

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Be careful of any sort of metal, tubular things in your baggage. I once was flying w/ 2 artist's tripods w/ telescoping legs in baggage, along w/ lots of oil paint tubes. Lead tubes I believe, they showed up as a blob on their scanner.

Suddenly flashes went off, and I was surrounded by several men in suits who looked like lineman for the Miami Dolphins football team. They were sorely disappointed that I was just another crazy passenger and not a terrorist.

Whenever I can, I take the train. Very casual, just stroll onto the train w/ your ticket, and as long as you're half dressed, half sober, and look OK, no problem. Off to the cafe bar to spend $16 on a microwaved sandwich and a Dixie beer (only on the City of New Orleans train, you're stuck w/ Bud, Coors and Miller on all the rest). The glassed in observation car is always full, what a great view.
 
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guangong

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If what you say is true, travel by rail would be a dry run for me since I am allergic to MSG, so those beers are out.
A few years ago a supervisor had to be called after x-raying my B+H windup movie camera, but usually the folks who check are just curious. My Minox always begins a friendly conversation.
Unless flying a great distance, with fighting traffic to airport, excessive delays, etc., I can be well on my way to my destination before plane even leaves the ground.
And I have plenty of leg room. In the early 1980s I took a budget flight in a plane originally designed to rescue Vietnamese, contemporary commercial planes make that trip seem luxuriously roomy.
 
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