Originally Posted by
PHLbuddy
I would be very careful. My uncle traveled with my late grandfather's ashes in October. He passed through AUS (usually a decent TSA operation), and they flipped out. They made him actually open the inside container. If at all possible, I'd recommend she carry a copy of the death certificate. The last thing you want is for them to call for a review of the xray and then start digging. Have her declare to a TSA agent in advance and it may make things easier.
Death certificate won't help any.
Originally Posted by
Global_Hi_Flyer
Domestically, you should be fine if you declare them to the TSA. IIRC, if there's a problem screening them, placing a coin under the urn ought to give them enough to distinguish what they are.
TSA is NOT supposed to open the container...
In a perfect world...
Originally Posted by
Emeraldcity
Unfortunately, sometimes they do. A friend of mine traveled with ashes and TSA opened the container and actually stuck something in the ashes to sift through them!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Gross!
TSA is just too inconsistent to predict what will happen when your mother gets to the airport. What may work on her way there, doesn't necessarily mean it will work the same on the way home. I have had some urns that were so dense on the checkpoint x-ray (even the quarter trick didn't work), but we were able to run them thru the CTX and see fine. Then we allowed it in as a carry on.