Flight crew concerns for EZE
 

Sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but there's concern among flight crews about safety in downtown BA.

http://www.flyertalk.com/the-hub/wha...over-city.html


Is the security situation really getting worse? I do recall it getting worse downtown, and then better, last decade, so I know it can change.

I don't think things have necessary gotten any worse over the past few years - I'd consider them stable, as in, use your street smarts, don't be a dumb tourist, and you'll not be likely to be a victim of a crime. Oh, and stay away from protests when they are occurring. This advice is suitable for pretty much any large city in the world. Bad things happen to good people all over the world, whether or not the country charges a reciprocity fee.

EZE is not as safe as it once was, say 20 years ago. Having said this, things have been stable over the past 4/5 years. Also, if flight crews stay in the area where they normally do, there is no need for concern as long as common sense is used.

I've not noticed a significant worsening of the security situation, although I have heard some Argentines (well-to-do sorts who have very nice flats in Puerto Madero and have offices in Microcentro) commenting about crime in the center recently (robbery in front of a respectable hotel at knifepoint and the like).

These same say that the neighborhood I live in (Palermo Hollywood/Chacarita) is very dangerous. I don't see that, and I walk most places, take the colectivo from time to time, taxis... but I take care to keep my iPhone in my pockets and out of sight when crossing the tracks between SoHo and Hollywood, and certainly wouldn't choose that as a place to count the money in my wallet!

I tend to think some street smarts can probably avoid 95% of the risk, and the other 5% is about as random as things like identity theft and credit card fraud. Things happen everywhere. What tends to happen where is the variable.

Upon reading the full article quoted, I think the mentioned pilot mugging may well be what the couple I met in Puerto Madero referred to.

Much of the article focuses on places that I would regard as far more dangerous. Indeed, I recently met a lovely couple (one from Denmark, the other from Venezuela) who moved to Buenos Aires from Caracas because they woke up one night to armed robbers in their house in Caracas. For now, anyway, they are not expecting that would happen to them here in Buenos Aires.

It would be interesting to learn more about what happened to these pilots -- and where. Obviously, crime can happen anywhere, but the story does strike me as a bit odd. Unless, of course, things have really changed for the worse.

If it's the same story as the one I heard about, something happened pretty much in front of the InterContinental hotel (which, glancing at a map, looks like it's actually in Monserrat, sandwiched between Microcentro and San Telmo.

I used to live about a half dozen blocks from there, and there did seem to be some dodgy blocks mixed in. Curious as you are precisely where this happened - and what for that matter. When I was living in that area, there were lots of stories of drug trafficking going on in Monserrat, which gave the area a reputation for crime. All the same, my house was a block from the Federal Police headquarters, and the immediate surroundings felt quite safe. Police response when needed was also very rapid (the security system triggered a couple times - otherwise never had anything happen that required a police response).

I really didn't care for the neighborhood that the IC was in. Microcentro, I actually liked, but a few walk homes at 3am had some sketchy guys around.

I know some pilots who fly to EZE, and I wouldn't be surprised if they got themselves into trouble. Pretty wild.

Sounds interesting..... so where are the details....? :p

There are plenty of sketchy folks on the street at 3am near where crews stay in San Francisco, too.

Perhaps the pilots went to one of those places on that show, I forgot what it was called, where the vixen aprovechadores drug them.

Well, that's why I wonder about this story. If two pilots go out for dinner in BA, get mugged and wind up in the hospital, that's more than a bit concerning. But if there's more to the story -- and I wouldn't be surprised if there is -- it's obviously less concerning for most visitors.

This can happen ANYWHERE. More likely @ EZE then, say, ZRH, but wouldn't be a shocking event anywhere in the USA.

Scam City?

I went to a strip club in Costa Rica once with a pilot from a US flagged carrier. Lets just say it was pretty memorable. I think I actually got on stage, and one of the ladies was asking for a belt to whip my behind. I put a stop to that pretty quickly. :)

Yup, that's it! I suppose the moral of your story is never travel with a belt.

You'd be surprised how many guys were starting to take their belts off to "help".

I suspect there is more to the story however what happened to them doesn't surprise me. In a city the size of BA with its fair share of poverty it's statistically bound to happen some time but I'd say it's a pretty rare event on the whole.
Although I feel relatively safe in BA I certainly wouldn't walk its streets at 3am in the morning especially if I'd had a few too many drinks and made it known I was a foreigner. Ditto for most cities I've visited around the world.....that's the time when the dodgy characters are out and about.

Its clear that action hungry visitors on the prowl will be more prone to incidents, but as other point out here, normal tourists with a less "aggressive" appetite should be OK as long as the least common of all senses is used appropriately.

Quite agree on the whole.

All in all, I'd probably feel more comfortable walking around much of BA at 3am than a lot of other cities (still not that I'd recommend it, of course)... that's just about the time all the locals are going out to the boliches, so unless you've wandered into the wrong areas, there are bound to be enough people in the streets that odds are still against anything serious happening. What's more, in the summer, anyway, the sun will be rising by the time the dance clubs are quieting down, so daylight works in one's favor on the way back from the night as well. I don't go out to the clubs much anymore, but between streets being lively at 3am, and sun coming out as nightclubs shut down, when I did go out, I always remember feeling at least as safe most nights out here as I used to in New York!

But there are also areas I'd be a bit careful most any time of day... And at night I've been inside some places that I'd say were pretty dodgy and made me feel like I had to leave before something bad happened. I've gotten the same feeling at times in Spain, London and France, though, so certainly things can happen pretty much anywhere.

The InterContinental is my go-to hotel when I'm in BA, having stayed there multiple times. The area is a bit dodgy, but mostly because it appears to be a business district and there's no life on the street after business hours or on the weekend. It doesn't seem inherently like an unsafe neighborhood.

At that time of night, I wouldn't be walking down the street - I'd take a cab.

Well, it happened to us (our kids included) four years ago in La Plata.

What a disturbing image :eek: