Make sure you wash your hands

[Mark K]

http://www.cnn.com/2010/TRAVEL/02/17/tsa.hands.swabbing/index.html?hpt=T2

[Jim Norman]

Wonder about this. Will washing work, what about our carry-ons and our clothes etc.? I figure I'll get stopped. Going to be interesting. I try to avoid flying at all and especially to matches. but sometimes it can't be helped, unless I just want to skip going.

I'd like to hear from people that are flying now for say the Florida Open or other matches.

Jim

[Dan Burwell]

Take this for what it's worth, but when TSA was recently swabing my shooting bag I said "you know that is my range bag and it will have residue on it" and the TSA guy told me smokless powder will not trip the machines and it didn't.

[Steve J]

Everything I own is covered in gunshot residue at one time or another.

[High Lord Gomer]

I read some of the comments on the original link above and I don't understand why some of those people get so jacked out of shape about it. As long as they are just testing for explosives, what's the problem?

I might change my tune if they ever ask me, "Excuse me, Mr. Gomer, but on your hands we found traces of diesel fuel, Tabasco, and Magic May's Sensual Cinnamon Motion Lotion. Just what kind of weekend did you have here in Detroit?"

[CSEMARTIN]

Take this for what it's worth, but when TSA was recently swabing my shooting bag I said "you know that is my range bag and it will have residue on it" and the TSA guy told me smokless powder will not trip the machines and it didn't.

I had the same experience.

[BSeevers]

I flew to a match a few weeks after 9/11 and drove straight to airport from range. Got stopped, swabbed and got real nervous. No problem then or since

Edited February 18, 2010 by BSeevers

[DyNo!]

Take this for what it's worth, but when TSA was recently swabing my shooting bag I said "you know that is my range bag and it will have residue on it" and the TSA guy told me smokless powder will not trip the machines and it didn't.

I had the same experience.

I'm not sure if it is true but the same happened to me.

[Thomas Moore]

I've had several TSA agents tell me smokeless powder will not show up on screening.

[Matt Cheely]

So what happens if you work at an explosives plant?

[Tom D.]

So IF smokeless doesn't show as GSR then the CSI teams around the country must be looking for black powder shootists. This doesn't ring true to me.

[Dan Hefta]

Take this for what it's worth, but when TSA was recently swabing my shooting bag I said "you know that is my range bag and it will have residue on it" and the TSA guy told me smokless powder will not trip the machines and it didn't.

+1 Same thing happened to me.

[Matt Cheely]

So IF smokeless doesn't show as GSR then the CSI teams around the country must be looking for black powder shootists. This doesn't ring true to me.

They're not looking for Gun Shot Residue, they're testing for High Explosive. Different...

[entropic]

I'd imagine they only test for real explosives and not just stuff that burns fast...otherwise anyone who visited a gas station in the last week would be sounding alarms.

Edited February 18, 2010 by entropic

[CHA-LEE]

I guess the TSA people are finally tired of harassing old ladies for having tooth paste of lotion in their hand bags. The whole security scanning stuff is a big joke. It serves only to make people think there is some level of security scanning being done. All the while they fill the bellies of the planes with unchecked freight and cargo.

This new hand swabbing thing will happen for a couple of months and then it will revert back to what it was before. Its all happened in the past and will happen again in the same way.

The reality is that a large portion of our economy revolves around air travel. The nation can’t afford to stop or even slow down the thousands of daily flights. Thus they can’t and never will be able to institute a truly effective and robust security scanning process in fear of disrupting the money making machine.

If they took the $$$ they spend on these stupid scanners and paid competent people to update the “Suspicious People and Activities Lists” we would all be better served. It shouldn’t take a top level FBI agent to figure out that a traveler from outside the country has purchased a ONE WAY ticket with cash to the USA and has no Luggage is a very suspicious traveler and should be treated as such. Almost all of the prior terrorist attackers did just this, but somehow the airlines or government don’t seem to linkage these obvious facts together. It honestly makes me sick thinking about the incompetence of the whole situation.

The reality is that no level of security that still allows the unhindered volume of travelers they currently allow through the system will be effective. If someone really wants to get on a plane and do bad things they can easily find a way to do it in using the grand canyon size holes the security system will always have.

[twodownzero]

I agree.

I also will add that I, generally, do not fly, prefer not to, and will drive no matter how far it is to avoid this nonsense.

Our government is not keeping us safe, there is no practical way for them do so, and it's just easier to pack the stuff in the truck and drive.

[grandbagger]

I guess that terrorists have never heard of gloves.

[jaredr]

So what happens if you work at an explosives plant?

SOL

[lowlands]

"Beyond Fear: Thinking Sensibly About Security in an Uncertain World." by Bruce Schneier should be a mandatory read before any politician takes office.

http://www.schneier.com/book-beyondfear.html

[Jadeslade]

I've been swabbed-no problem. Maybe the swabs don't work. The puffers didn't work either. All paper money in America will test positive for cocaine, though. They need to look for the bomber, not the bomb.

[Duane Thomas]

might change my tune if they ever ask me, "Excuse me, Mr. Gomer, but on your hands we found traces of diesel fuel, Tabasco, and Magic May's Sensual Cinnamon Motion Lotion. Just what kind of weekend did you have here in Detroit?"

Hey, if you'd just had that kind of weekend, you'd probably be so relaxed it wouldn't bother you at all. Of course, bragging is always a bad thing.

[GrumpyOne]

I fly back and forth from Florida to Puerto Rico quite a lot in my work. In San Juan, they have one of the, well, I call it a "sniffer" for lack of a better term. It blows air all around you and then samples it. I can tell you for a fact (from personal experience!) that IT WILL pick up powder residue from your shoes, if they are the same shoes you wore to the range the day before. It has happened to me 3 times, after the 3rd time, I made it a point, that before I get on the plane in Orlando, I walk though the tall, wet grass at my office, kind of washing my shoes. Since then, no problems with the "sniffer". Now, in all fairness, it might not have been picking up on the smokeless powder, but I do shoot black powder quite often as well.

[Chris Keen]

I left Tuesday for Florida, so I missed out on the hand swabbing, but I did have a small slowdown on the bag swab. The TSA agent called for a supervisor, and he asked me a number of questions, swabbed my cleats, and said have a great match!

[joecichlid]

I might change my tune if they ever ask me, "Excuse me, Mr. Gomer, but on your hands we found traces of diesel fuel, Tabasco, and Magic May's Sensual Cinnamon Motion Lotion. Just what kind of weekend did you have here in Detroit?"

Well when you get done x-raying my laptop let me fire it up and I will show you the videos and photos.

Joe W.

[Chris Keen]

I flew back from Florida on Tuesday, and they were checking people as we boarded the airplane, but they thought I looked innocent enough they didn't stop me!