UK Traveler

As I was getting on a flight at DTW today, the gate agent stopped me and said I had 3 carry-ons as I had a laptop, a fanny pack and a neck pouch with my travel documents. I told her I had never been told that in the past. She said toss it or put it away, so I put in in the laptop case.

Totally nuts. Is security at DTW more careful because of the Christmas Day incident? Going there, I was allowed to put my Kindle in with other items. DTW made the Kindle be in it's own tote as it went through the scanner. Weird.

SFOSpiff

The Christmas Day event was actually at DTW (Detroit), not DFW (Dallas Ft. Worth).

I'm amazed someone managed to outperform Ryanair in irrational rule enforcement. That's quite an accomplishment. ^

sk3

I used to always wear over my shoulder my Bose headsets in their carrying case, and I'd have my rollaboard and a pocketbook - but on my last trip LAX T4's elite line escalator guard forbid me entrance until I put the headsets in my bag. The problem was I didn't have any space left so I had to take out my book in order to comply. Because you're allowed to carry a book in addition to your 2 carryon's but not wear your headsets around your shoulder.

(Just wanted to vent belatedly as it's in the same nutsy ballpark as what happened to the OP).

Majuki

This is crazy. It's almost as crazy as LGW/LHR only allowing "one" carryon item for awhile. If I remember, the security staff would consider all items physically connected to be one item, but it had to be that way going through security. It's ridiculous since these items are only consolidated for purposes of boarding the aircraft or perhaps a security line and removed right after this point.

As far as electronics go, Kindles, iPads, netbooks, etc, are supposed to be able to go through inside your carryon whereas full-size laptops, bulky electronics, etc are supposed to go through separately (but can be inside a neoprene sleeve or checkpoint-friendly butterfly case). I've also been told anything with a regular hard drive needs to go through separately. Yet, I will still get yelled at if my laptop with an SSD stays in its case even though no place in the world has given my camcorder with a hard disk a second glance buried deep inside the camera bag.

swag

If this was the gate agent as you were boarding, then this was not a TSA encounter and has nothing to do with security. It's the airline agent being over-zealous when enforcing the rules.

In my experience, strictness about number and size of carry-ons varies mostly with the individual agents. Trying to associate it by airport or by airline usually is inaccurate when you have a larger sample size of more trips.

DFW is my home airport, and I haven't noticed them being unusually zealous, for me or for other passengers.

UK Traveler

I was wrong in my airport. It did happen in Detroit, DTW.

sbagdon

There also appears to be a functional relationship between FAA oversight at that moment, and fines given/threatened by the FAA to the carrier.

Didn't DL recently go medieval on carry-on dimensions, after some FAA actions?

Remember, the airline submits their processes, the FAA insures the carrier is following them. These are rules that have always existed, and differ from airline to airline, yet yes... a neck pouch seems sorta odd.

bajajoes

I'd be real curious to know what would have happened IF you had just put the neck pouch under your shirt or sweater or whatever so it wasn't visible.@:-)
Would it still count as 3?
IF so they are _________! (fill in blank with your own expletive)

UK Traveler

There have been times when I have worn it under my clothing as I boarded the plane--usually when dressed differently then yesterday. I saw so many people at my layover point--O'Hare walking around wearing their neck pouches and having a purse and a bag. I asked one woman who was sitting beside me if she had been questioned about having 3 items while we were waiting at O'Hare and she said she wouldn't have done it. Probably more of a road warrior than I am.

The gate agent said if she didn't make me put it in the laptop bag, she could be fined by the FAA.

KDS

"More careful"? Nope.

"More stupid"? Yes.

This is why I avoid DTW as the first airport in any inbound/outbound trip as much as possible now, choosing to use FNT instead.

Flaflyer

No it did not. NW 253 was somewhere over Canada when Umar set his gonads on fire. He boarded the plane in Amsterdam, so he saw their security not TSA. The incident was over when a passenger jumped him. The plane's destination and actual landing site was DTW, where the US arrested him. But no incident happened at DTW.

alanR

What Ryanair does is rational as it's people who don't read their rules or think the rules don't apply to them are a significant income stream to Ryanair. About 20% of Ryanair income comes from ancillary items like "Mr Don't You Know Who I Am".

UK Traveler

This was a UAL flight.

dranz

It's not a DTW "thing." It is a "United" thing. The UAL operation at Detroit has
been ghastly bad for at least 10 years.

UK Traveler

I have no plans to go to Detroit again, but will fly Delta next time.