Carryons: 2l of Salad Dressing, GPS & Compass?
 

I know there's not going to be some written rule against salad dressing, but this is a serious question. I am visiting on the west coast this weekend, and have always stocked up on some great Japanese salad dressings available in OR that are not sold "back east". Pre 9/11 I have had no problems carrying these jugs back home, but with the messages I have seen posted about being asked to drink from beverages being carried, etc. I wonder if I'll be asking for additional hassle.

Similarly, I might (weather permitting) go geocaching while on this trip, and would prefer not to check my GPS and compass due to their value and fragility (and liquid filledness of the compass). Will these items arouse suspicion and subject me to further hassle?

Any thoughts? Thanks in advance.

------------------
UAL free since the last millennium - and planning to stay that way!

Let me know what you experience with the GPS and compass. I am a new geocacher and am looking forward to having something to do that gets me out of the hotel room! My first trip with the GPS will be on the 11th. BTW have you used it on the plane?

Mikefly -

I have not successfully used a GPS onboard. I tried once on a Midway flight but had an aisle and did not get tracking lock. (I should add my GPS is, by most standards, primitive). Most of my travel is on AA, and they have a formal policy in their "prohibited devices" that says GPS recievers are not to be used onboard.

I haven't tried to skirt that rule, even though I would like to see a heading, altitude, and groundspeed display, which should be available given decent reception.

I think the GPS itself shouldn't be a big deal, but my compass is a 5" tactical sailng compass mounted on a 6" square of plywood (was used in catamaran racing so was a lash on type mounting). I'm worried that this may cause additional scrutiny.

------------------
UAL free since the last millennium - and planning to stay that way!

I've flown every week post-Sept 11 with my GPS and have not had it questioned, except during one (of many) random bag checks. In that case, all I had to do was turn it on.

I've also used it on planes, although not very often. You have to have patience and a good window seat. It easily answers the "I wonder what town that is?" question!

Comet

I always travel with my GPS (it is also my CellPhone) and have had no problems thru security. And to using on AA, I have not yet done it (did on AS with no prob, but before 9-11) but on the GPS newsgroup they said to ask the Captain or FO or even a FA. Most find it interesting and if they are not overwhelmed they might allow it. Never hurts to ask, but be sure to ASK First, so as to not cause an unplanned security incident.

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif

Southwest speficially allows personal GPS use while inflight, and says so in the in-flight magazine. It's the only airline that I'm aware of with this policy.

About the salad dressing I remember reading somewhere NOT to bring dark liquids on board. I have no idea why, but that's what it said and it kept me from bringing some cough medicine with me on board on a flight.

What is this? I'm always looking for something to do while traveling that will keep me from sitting in my hotel room watching the tube.

Onedog - check out http://www.geocaching.com, all your questions will be answered. only you can decide if it's interesting to you, but some of the "caches" around here are virtual caches, but obscure historical markers. Gets you out, you get excercise and fresh air (well, depending on the area you explore) and the "thrill of the hunt".


------------------
UAL free since the last millennium - and planning to stay that way!

[This message has been edited by fholt (edited 02-05-2002).]

We've traveled several times lately, both before and after September 11th, with a DeLorme Earthmate GPS receiver that plugs into my laptop.

I've had great success with tracking when sitting at a window seat (receiver slipped between the inner window and the pull-down screen works great. No success in the aisle seat.

On UA have only been questioned once, by the 1st Officer, and he only wanted to verify that the device was certified -- no problem.

On AA, was stopped and pointed out that GPS is on the "prohibited" list, as mentioned above in this thread, and is specifically listed in the in-flight magazine.

OT: Took the setup on a Miami - Western Caribbean cruise, and it was great. Using the Street Atlas USA software from DeLorme it tracked us across the US to MIA, then tracked the cruise down the coast of FL and showed the coastline of Cuba (not identified as such), the islands of Cozumel, Grand Cayman and Jamaica, also without identification, but all with geographic orientation, and tracked our "altitude" of 3x,000' on the flights and 80' in our cabin on the boat.

AA is my carrier of choice so I guess I am out of luck. Can't figure out why they would ban it as it is a totally passive device. Guess I'll send an e-mail to AA and see what the response is, as well as asking the pilot if I can turn it on anyway. My GPS is the Etrex which looks a lot like a cell phone so I can already see a pax telling me I can't have a phone on http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif

The explanation also showed up on the GPS Bulletin Board. The reason for prohibition seems to come from an incident involving a Teen-age Boy with a GPS on a NYC to MIA flight. Seems the boy was tracking the flight and noticed that the plane had passed by MIA (normal flight pattern) and seemed to be heading straight toward Havana (before making the turn to come in from the West). He shouted out that the plane was being Hi-jacked to Cuba and caused some panic on the plane. (This was in 1998 or 1999) So the airline decided to ban them. But like I pointed out earlier, sometimes if you ask the Captain or FO nicely, they may allow the in-flight use. Never hurts to ask.

This all sounds interesting. Would someone please post a link to the GPS bulletin board?

Danski

I spoke with AA yesterday. Of course no one knew why. The first answer was "due to 9-11" Aaaarrrrgggghhhhh I then pointed out that the ban was in place prior to 9-11 so they would have to try harder. Next resposne was it is a security issue and we will not discuss it. Finally another managere admitted she had no idea and would check into it for me and call me.

By now I am sure I have a really thick file at AA and will be randomly selected on my next flight. http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif

I'm going to get way over my head very quickly, because while I spend some of my days playing with fancy toys to produce radio news, I leave most heavy lifting beyond the "ON/OFF" and "RECORD" switches to the engineers who know what all those little electronic doodads behind the face of the control panel are.

Essentially, however, every radio receiver beyond the crystal sets of the early 20th century is also a radio transmitter. That is caused by the physics of the circuitry that is used to amplify, discriminate, and make useful the signal coming in from the antenna and it is an unavoidable side effect.

There is a small possibility that these low-power transmissions, even though they are tiny fractions of a watt, can affect some of the navigational instruments of an aircraft, so to be "better safe than sorry" many airlines insist that all radio receivers are supposed to be turned off when an aircraft is in flight. This applies to AM, FM, TV, -- and GPS.

Cell phones, of course have both a receiver and a transmitter hundreds of times more powerful than these side-effect transmissions, so they're prohibited also. They don't work well in the air anyway, because the terrestrial infrastructure of the cell phone system wasn't designed to handle a caller moving from cell to cell at 500mph or calling from an altitude that causes the signal to reach many more cells than a ground-based signal.

If you like them so much, why not ship them home? That would solve the allow or not allow carryons problem.

I undertand about the salad dressings COMPLETELY fholt. A recent trip to HI yielded a fantastic wasabi sale that had me pack one entire bag devoted to this product only. But liquids, I'm not sure about. I agree that it would perhaps be better to pack the bottles up and ship them to your home.. Besides, it would be much easier on your back (a lot less weight in your carry-ons). I recently shipped myself some Wasabi dressings from SEA; had a friend out there pack 'em up and UPS 'em, pretty cheaply too. They arrived unbroken and delicious!

Thanks fholt. Looks interesting. Now all I have to do is convince the Mrs. that I really need a GPS.

Does anyone know of a site that compares different GPS units and makes recommendations (sort of Consumer Reports style?).

CO allows GPS receivers (it's printed in the magazine).

I specifically asked the captain of a CO flight once - absolutely no prob...

Make sure you have a window seat.

cpd

p.s. I was on a bunch of pivate jet flights just recently, and the pilot told me that the "no electronics under 10,000 feet rule" was to CYA - in case gameboy hit someone in the head - or in case of emergency, it wasn't in the way. It had nothing to do with navigation. Same for cell phones - as that's all about commerce.

news: sci.geo.satellite-nav

Sorry I can't get the link to work. Just copy into the address bar. or google it.

I'm just having fun imagining...

"So what's in your bag, sir?"

"Just the usual. Two jugs of salad dressing and my global positioning device!"

Watchful LMAO Thanks

OneDog try the websites for garmin and magellan two of the better manufacturers.

geocaching.com also has some of the information you are looking for.

This thread has me wondering about any caches at airports? Hmmmm maybe we can do it but probably will have to be virtual caches.

MikeFly: I recently started doing some geocaching and also thought it would be fun for those interested to do some at airports. I suspect since 9/11 though any cache found by the wrong person would immediately require airport evacuation. http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/frown.gif What would a virtual cache be? Would that mean the cache might be something permanent in the airport such as the No Smoking sign at gate 26, or something like that? Anyway ... I'm interested.

Letiole I too am new at gecaching. As I understand it virtual caches are like you described. You would give the coordinates and some kind of clue like the third letter from the left and people would post their answer to see if they are correct. You are correct an actual cache at an airport would be difficult and may trigger a security event. The only thing I thought of is getting a club member to hold a package (naturally explaining it and letting them examine it. Then in the clue post the hours the cache can be inquired about.

If you like contact me off the board to discuss further.

MikeFlyYou have mail!

I've found a site that lists airlines that do allow and airlines that don't allow gps units to be used onboard.

www.gpsinformation.net/airgps/airgps.htm

Well, I'm home now, and the GPS was not an issue, not even when I was "randomly selected" for some additional screening at STL. That was on the outbound, so no dressing on me at that time. I was asked to drink some water (from a bottle I had in my carryon that was sealed - I opened it and complied but what if it had been jugs of Rikki Rikki soy Ginbger dressing?).

No worries at all on the way home. I did leave my big compass home, in favor of a teeny one that only points out general directions. We were after easy ones anyway, so no problems at all.



------------------
UAL free since the last millennium - and planning to stay that way!

fholt wrote:
This is interesting. My 12-year-old son wants to take water samples from airplanes and bring them home to test for colliforms and such. This could pose some problems.

this seems to be common practice on occasion at least. He shuld be OK bringing samples form the flight home... http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif

I the past 3 years, I have used my GPS on at least 48 of my last 50 flights and only once told to turn it off once (on AA)

On many of these flights, the FA's noticed that I was holding the thing up to the window & most knew it was indeed a GPS too. The main airlines I was on: UA, US, AA, AC, LH, VS, plus several other smaller flag carriers, commuters, cessna operators & helicopter services. I love using the GPS on a flight.

Once, on Air Canada, I was invited up to the flight deck during the flight to "use it" with the pilots. The GPS wouldn't work up in the cockpit though, because of gold laminate & other protective stuff in the windscreen.

I have never by questioned by security, just asked to turn it on a few times.

Many times we carry an unopened bottle (or 2) of red wine. Have done since 09/11. The bag will get pulled out in order to verify that the bottle is still sealed. Once it passes inspection, we're on our way

It is just frustrating to have to buy a new cork screw on every trip.

Re: geocaching

Possibly more interesting than geocaching is the Degree Confluence Project : be the first to visit the exact interesection of some line of longitude and latitude, take a 360 degree panorama, and you earn everlasting fame and a place on this website. Some excellent photos and descriptions.

The best starting point for GPS info is http://joe.mehaffey.com/

A good place to buy Garmin stuff is http://www.tvnav.com/navhome.html

(I have no connection to any of the above, I'm just a satisfied onlooker/user/customer).