Originally Posted by
blue bear
Mrs. Bear had her bag scooted over by security for a suspicious object. Once ownership of said bag was determined, contents were examined and dangerous object extracted: a small vulcanized rubber disc 3" in diameter and 1" thick. Granted, being hit by a slapper with this object can really be an "ow!" situation - but I was laughing at the mystified looks examining a hockey puck...
Perhaps it looked like a solid mass?
Originally Posted by
CJ91
A small tube of toothpaste tripped their alarms for me recently. The person in front of me was for a stack of business cards.
The most annoying part was they had to get a manager to clear it and of course there was 1 manager to share between several scanners so took some time.
Are these new scanners meant to be so sensitive?
I honestly can't remember a time when I've gotten through LHR security unscathed -- the scanners always seem to have an algorithm that looks for something to highlight as dangerous. Some highlights:
- a few pens I swiped from the hotel bedside, for not being in the liquids bag because "pens have ink in them, ink is a liquid" -- funnily enough it also happened about 1.5 hours earlier from MAN (where I originated), in addition to a bag of gummy bears that apparently counted as liquids
- 20 cm long shoelace samples for being an "object of strangulation" (completely ignoring the fact that I was wearing standard-length shoelaces that were much longer and easier to strangle someone with -- if you can strangle someone with a piece of string shorter than a handspan, that's quite some feat)
- a large sealed plastic container of popcorn purchased from Disneyland Paris
- an F&M picnic hamper with tea, biscuits, & chocolate (no jams, alcohol, or other liquids inside) -- apparently the paper looked like "unknown shavings"
- (multiple times) the liquids in sealed amenity kits you receive on board needing to go in your liquids bag
- bamboo chopsticks (the takeout kind) that was deemed too dangerous to take on board and had to be disposed of, but leaving my metal straw in the same compartment alone
Compounded with the BA nTP massacre, I find fewer and fewer reasons to transit LHR these days.