Depending on the country you visit and its sensitivity, it may be a good idea. In my position with work, I often register or update my travel plan account with the State Dept. for international trips.
Look at the website www.state.gov and you will see that they have a Safe Traveler Enrollment Program (STEP) that has a lot of useful info.
Posts: 1517 | Location: Idaho Falls, Idaho | Registered: 03 June 2004
Never have. I do try and stay out of war zones at this point in life. If things are that unstable I just look somewhere else for the time being. Outfits like lobal Rescue are a good idea though. As long as people at home know about where you will be and sat/cell numbers you should be good. Then again you might miss one of the State Dept. warnings to leave an area so it could be usefull I guess.
Happiness is a warm gun
Posts: 4106 | Location: USA | Registered: 06 March 2002
I have endured short run political and societal breakdown in an African country. When things go truly south, the first thing the American Embassy (or any other) will do is evacuate all their "non-essential personnel". They will therefore be running with a skeleton crew and will almost certainly be very little help to the average citizen. Given that, rather than whining to the embassy about how bad things are getting so you can get on a State Dept flight out, you are much better off just catching a commercial plane on your own.
The ONLY reason I can see to do the former rather than the latter is if you don't have the money to evacuate yourself (the State Dept will evacuate you if you sign a promissory note). That said, they will NOT evac you to the place of your choice but to one of three or four reasonable nearby options of THEIR choice (No, you don't get to choose from their options...it's random). Now, if you don't have the money to evac yourself, how much fun would it be to find yourself evacuated from Timbuktu to Cyprus when you are from the USA? How would you pay for hotels/food under those circumstances? The moral of this story is "always carry enough cash AND credit cards to buy your way out of SHTF and cover your own ass".
As for "missing state department warnings to leave" if you are not registered with the embassy....trust me, CNN or Al Jazeera will make it clear that SHTF well before any embassy gets around to sending an email to you.
Originally posted by tendrams: I have endured short run political and societal breakdown in an African country. When things go truly south, the first thing the American Embassy (or any other) will do is evacuate all their "non-essential personnel". They will therefore be running with a skeleton crew and will almost certainly be very little help to the average citizen. Given that, rather than whining to the embassy about how bad things are getting so you can get on a State Dept flight out, you are much better off just catching a commercial plane on your own.
The ONLY reason I can see to do the former rather than the latter is if you don't have the money to evacuate yourself (the State Dept will evacuate you if you sign a promissory note). That said, they will NOT evac you to the place of your choice but to one of three or four reasonable nearby options of THEIR choice (No, you don't get to choose from their options...it's random). Now, if you don't have the money to evac yourself, how much fun would it be to find yourself evacuated from Timbuktu to Cyprus when you are from the USA? How would you pay for hotels/food under those circumstances? The moral of this story is "always carry enough cash AND credit cards to buy your way out of SHTF and cover your own ass".
As for "missing state department warnings to leave" if you are not registered with the embassy....trust me, CNN or Al Jazeera will make it clear that SHTF well before any embassy gets around to sending an email to you.
Excellent advice. I worked in war zones as a matter of course over a long period. Never once registered with an embassy, because I had access to my own company's airplanes and if we could make it to the airport, we had a ride out of town. Making it to the airport was a trick every once in a while, particularly once in Luanda when the truce broke down.
If I were working in vacation spots like Liberia or Sierra Leone or Cote d'Ivoire, I probably would register. I don't know how much good it would do, though.
But in the usual hunting destinations, I wouldn't worry about it. Only time I ever went to an embassy in Africa was in the old Nairobi spot that got blown up, to get some passport pages added.
Posts: 11729 | Location: Florida | Registered: 25 October 2006
Ya..."Getting to the airport" is always the trick isn't it! My understanding is that the embassy will arrange transport to airports and that is probably a good reason to at least have your embassy contact info and know its location. That said, by the time they get around to calling people to arrange that crap, it's probably a good idea to already be gone. Further, I was much more comfortable taking a nice low profile taxi to the airport than a big blacked out van that screamed "American Embassy!" by its very appearance.
than a big blacked out van that screamed "American Embassy!
= RPG magnet...
You got it. Come to think of it though, it doesn't even need to be an RPG and it almost doesn't need to be identifiable as a US gov vehicle. For the situation to go really wrong, all this is required is a crowd of angry people able to stop the vehicle and drag you out of it for being a "wealthy foreigner" of any national origin. Unless some guys are armed in that embassy van, I'd rather dress like a poor local and take the public bus to the airport, thanks.
No, not unless I am going to reside in the country for more than 6 months. If you're going to a country with thousands of American tourists it serves no purpose anyway.
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AR, where the hopeless, hysterical hypochondriacs of history become the nattering nabobs of negativisim.
Posts: 7046 | Location: Rambouillet, France | Registered: 25 June 2004
My understanding is that the embassy will arrange transport to airports and that is probably a good reason to at least have your embassy contact info and know its location. That said, by the time they get around to calling people to arrange that crap, it's probably a good idea to already be gone. Further, I was much more comfortable taking a nice low profile taxi to the airport than a big blacked out van that screamed "American Embassy!" by its very appearance.
