Walking Sticks, Canes, and Airports (TSA)

[cgt4570]

It is normal for them to check for explosives in this manner. I have a prosthetic leg and the first time they did it I was not happy. But I understood why and they were polite. I also reload and shoot a lot and was concerned that they might pick up some kind of gunpowder residue but it has never happened.

Smokeless powder is a propellant, not an explosive. The airport sensors aren't calibrated to pick it up. They have no reason to. As others have said, they are mainly looking for nitrates.

 

[federali]

Folding Cane

As I have intermittent knee problems, I always travel with a folding cane in my carry-on luggage unless I happen to need the cane at the airport. Never been an issue.

While standing in a long ticket buyers' line at a Paris museum, leaning on my cane, a security guard came over and ushered my wife and I to the front of the line. It's a courtesy I didn't know about but apparently common in Paris.

 

[mrrick]

I go back and forth to the middle east a few times a year and always have my "Cane Master" made of hickory. About as formidable as a Louisville slugger, and no one dares ask about it. It's the only deadly weapon that they have to let you take on an airplane.

Even in the states it's an EDC.

Cane Masters!, Walking Canes for mobility, self-defense, exercise and rehabilitation

 

[AudOneAk]

M&M Mini's cause panic...

My 13 yr old daughter & I were flying AK to GA for my son's army graduation. We thought we were smart by taking a "roll" of quarters for easy grabbing in a left over mini m&m case. (They fit perfect, it's bright, easy to see in your carry on...)
I was in a wheelchair, my tiny daughter was pushing me, we went through the scanners and all the sudden they grabbed us, thru on a vest, carried the bag like it would explode and took us aside. Asked us whose bag, could they reach in...and pulled out the m&m container with two fingers holding it very carefully and far away!
"What is in the CONTAINER?" "Quarters" "Do I have your permission to open it right now?" "Of course, it's just quarters for soda machines as we travel." I have never seen anyone seem so frightened opening anything before! He told me it showed up on the screen looking like an explosive they are trained to watch for that always comes in a tube! Learned my lesson!

 

[Stevens]

I have found that by dragging my leg and putting a pillow under my coat in the rear helps plenty. Most time I over hear them say "hear comes the hunch back of Notre Dame" I grunt and the let me thru, blackened out teeth and old tattered clothes help too. just a thought,>wink<

And I'll bet on the plane there are empty seats next to yours too, soon after they get a good look at you.
Smart idea!
Steve W

 

[AZretired]

I'm 63 with a hip that's giving me trouble as I get older and have taken to carrying a a home made hickory cane ( i enjoy making them for friends) and TSA has never questioned it. I too read somewhere that due to the ADA they cannot question why need a cane.

 

[BC38]

Question.....if your at a stage in your life where you need a cane. How effective are you defending yourself with one ????

More effective than you are going to be defending yourself WITHOUT one I'll bet...

 

[Golddollar]

On another site I read that the Americans with Disability Act forbids them from even asking why you need the cane. I've also heard that anything that resembles a shillelagh is verboten in the UK (and probably elsewhere). Seems the Irish guys split quite a few heads with them in the last couple of centuries of British occupation.

At the lab for a blood draw I ran into a guy carrying a shillelagh who told me that the Irish invented golf. He said they used their shillelaghs to hit sheep droppings into gopher holes.

 

[ISCS Yoda]

I'm 63 with a hip that's giving me trouble as I get older and have taken to carrying a a home made hickory cane ( i enjoy making them for friends) and TSA has never questioned it. I too read somewhere that due to the ADA they cannot question why need a cane.

I stumbled on this old thread and I like it so I am resurrecting it.

Now that my knees are bad enough to warrant using a cane I never fly without one. A few years ago, when I figured I looked old enough, anyway, I flew with one, anyway. TSA only has one requirement - they want to x-ray the stick. The first time I did this was with an African-made cane, made out of 4 different pieces of wood, with a hippopotamus on the head. In order to fasten the 4 pieces together an iron rod ran through the cane. TSA did not like it at first but when they realized the stick could NOT come apart they let it go, satisfied no weapon was concealed inside.

What they didn't recognize was that the weight of that stick and the hippo's head were more than sufficient as a weapon but, again, ADA rules DO apply, so a cane is a cane and they allowed it. I never used that one again because I didn't like arousing their attention.

Currently, the canes that I use are custom made shillelaghs or other cool canes, one actually being from Ireland. They make great walking sticks as well as great weapons and I am afraid that the golf story above is a myth.

The shillelagh was originally just a cudgel, maybe 2 feet long. Called a "bata" I think. The British outlawed them way back when because they didn't want Irish folks to carry weapons. The folks figured out that the British couldn't ban "canes"/walking sticks so they lengthened them.

That's pretty close to precise history as I know it. And I might be old and have bad knees but when I have to travel to places where my guns can't go it would be a mistake to think I was unarmed when I have one of my canes with me.

 

[LenS]

ISCS Yoda, I like your approach.


However about ADA. You should change your wording from "Can't" to "Shouldn't". In Dec. 2001 coming back home from SeaTac I encountered a very arrogant airport security dweeb (it was before they officially became TSA) who pulled a CVS prescription bottle out of my carry-on and started the inquisition of what is it (it was well marked) and WHY I had it! I became very short with her and never answered her extra-nosy questions. No she should never have asked but I guess she never got the memo. ADA is older than that as it got invoked at DEC back in the late 1980s as I recall.

 

[italiansport]

Is anyone on the forum aware of a training class that us oldsters can take on using a walking cane as a defensive weapon? I've looked and not come up with anything.
Jim

 

[WR Moore]

To answer a question posed above, most metal detectors are free standing and trying to use one for support will result in you and the detector being on the ground.

Explosive detectors and possibly the see through gadgets (no experience with the see throughs) may be substantial enough to support you. Kinda depends.

 

[H Richard]

For defensive information, check the internet for Defensive Canes, and there are some designed specifically for that, and the company (I don't recall the mane) has information on their website.

 

[Conklin]

Some people don't need them to walk. They play like they need them so they have a legal weapon. Larry

They are also a traditional accoutrement for a well-dressed gentleman regardless of (dis)ability.

 

[fredj338]

Although this may or may not be true wrt TSA in the US, back in 2000 we had a 4 hour (middle of night) stop-over in Zürich and I watched them wheel in this monstrous machine. While they were setting up I asked one of the (I assume) Zürich police officers if it picked up gun powder residue from shooting and the answer was no. When we went thru that checkpoint they were swabbing bags and the machine read the results. No issues.

Current tech picks up fired gun powder res. i git tagged in atlanta once from just packing my shooting gear after a weekend match.

 

[diyj98]

They are also a traditional accoutrement for a well-dressed gentleman regardless of (dis)ability.

Or the stereotypical pimp.

 

[BE Mike]

Question.....if your at a stag in your life where you need a cane. How effective are you defending yourself with one ????

Unless highly trained in the martial arts involving a cane, I tend to think that it is false security to have one for self-defense. It actually may give an aggressor a weapon (as he takes it from you) and increase your chances of serious injury. Same thing with a knife. A weapon is only as good as the training/ skill a person has wielding it.

 

[LoboGunLeather]

I sometimes need to use a cane, and I keep one in the truck in case of need.

Not as long or heavy as the pugil sticks we trained with in the Army, nor as effective as the M14 for vertical or horizontal butt strokes, but certainly longer and heavier than the batons we trained with as young cops.

I suspect that I would be better off defending myself with a cane than trying to do so bare handed.

 

[riverrat38]

If an assailant took a cane away from a senior citizen, and commenced viciously assaulting said citizen with said cane, the citizen might need to defend himself with a CCW.
"I knew that I was in danger of grievous bodily harm".

Best,
Rick

 

[Chazman1946]

Their used to be a defensive Umbrella that people had taken on flights with no problems, thus thing was almost indestructible, they demo it by having in a 250 lbs man jump up and down on it while it was propped up between two chairs.

The then showed a video of how to use it as a club, the guy beating a punching bag with it, them turning the pointed tip and jabbing an penetrating the cavass on the bag. This was probably more effective then a Police Riot Baton. Forget the name though!