Originally Posted by
InkUnderNails
...Since my screening was done I was suspicious of his motive. It was a vary thorough bag check involving multiple swabs and running back through the xray. The checker even made a comment that most Pelican cases in up checked and they do not see them carried on. The question was after all of this.
I asked defensively, "Why do you need to know?"
"Sir, I just need to know your name."
Not quite on topic but it's not worth a separate thread, so I'll bounce off this.
I flew two flights within Australia today (SYD- x and x-SYD). At both SYD and the other airport, there was no line to speak of, I was able to get through the WTMD with my stupid metal hip without an alarm, and I had minimal carry-on (handbag and ASUS Transformer) so the main checkpoint part was painless. But in both airports, I got stopped after I collected my bags for the "random" ETD.
I decided to see how far I could push it before they got difficult. This morning I said to the guy in a half-joking tone: "I get this every time*, how can you call this random?" and this afternoon when the guy asked "have you done this before?" I said "Every. single. time. including this morning. You guys must think I look really suspicious." Notably, there was no attitude in response, and both times a few seconds after they put the swab in the machine they said "Okay, you're fine."
* I don't actually get picked for ETD
every time, but it's
way above "random" - maybe 3 out of 4 transits... And without much effort, I've
never had an alarm.