Just went through customs in Detroit yesterday. Neither my TufPac or my luggage came on the conveyor as before, but were intercepted by customs and segregated in a "must inspect" area. I was told that they scan all luggage for weapons and ammo and therefore "intercepted" both bags.

Not really a big deal, but if your stuff doesn't come down the slide (as mine always had before), don't worry, it's probably in the "inspection" area. The guys and ladies there were quite professional and polite. I even was recognized by an officer as "the judge who goes every year with cool guns." He even directed one of his juniors to escort me to TSA to get my luggage expedited so I'd not miss my plane.

I'm glad that the scanning equipment is good enough now that it was recognized that I had a gun and ammo in my luggage before either was "put in play". Maybe they'll catch some folks up to no good?

Another aside: Dogs were everywhere. Several folks got caught with fruit and other foods. A beagle took special interest in my boots. The handler asked if the discolorations were blood (with a smile.... I was dumbfounded!). I reckoned that they were and the handler just smiled and directed the dog elsewhere.

As a final note, outside of my presence, my TufPac was openned at least once on the way over (in Amsterdam) and twice on the way back. I had modified my case to use a TSA lock. Not a bad idea as it turned out. Each entry was noted with a sticker on my bag/TufPac. Also, in Jacksonville, Dar and Detriot (coming back) NWA wanted to see the method of containment of my ammo. TSA wanted to see it after I cleared customs coming back. I had the Tupperware looking boxes, taped with "Gilbert created" logo description of caliber and bullet. No problems there.

Dar was the only place where anyone wanted to see the Dutch permit. Make sure you make several extra copies because they want to keep one there.

Judge,

welcome home and glad to hear your trip through detroit went well. The folks there have never been an issue for me at TSA, customs or immigration. The problems I have had were with NW staff. Like them not knowing that my guns weren't coming down the chute and neither weas my bag as each were tagged special handling. Customs, in fact, came to get me while I was having a dsicussion with one of the red coats and asked if I was me and then like youl, had a fellow escort me all the way through to the final re-screen and such.

Like you said, if your bags don't slide down the chute head for the customs check and my bet is that they'll be waiting for you.

Judge, are you saying people other than TSA can open a TSA lock? i e Dar or Amsterdam. I thought it was illegal for anyone other than the owner to open a case with firearms or ammo.

My bags where searched in Amsterdam and they had TSA locks.

My TSA lock was cut off of my gun case. Probably in Joburg, maybe Beira, Moz.

Wrenchmaster and I had our ammo cases opened some where along the way to Dar but the tuffpaks were unmolested as we had the original style locks. On the return trip all went well and when we went through baggage claim in Seattle, we were paged so NWA could retrieve our bags and escort us to Customs where they checked the serial #s against our 4457, then asked what we were hunting, then wanted to see pics. They never looked at anything else!

in lusaka the guys that came in after us had the whole lock mechanism cut off their tuffpack. my guns were delayed for a day. came into atlanta the next day. we kept on the phone until we were sure they were in atlanta. we called customs both in minnneapolis and atlanta explaining that the guns were in a takedown case, inside of another bag and there were 9 locks to go through, asking them if they would ship it up to minneapolis and go through the customs there. Instead they opened the tsa lock on the bag and never even looked in the takedown case, instead just shipped it to our house. go figure. maybe they thought that we weren't going to mobilize to invade iran with 2 hunting rifles afterall.