Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2024/04/24/turks-and-caicos-imprisons-american-tourists-over-ammunition-in-luggage.html
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No sympathy. You should not have loose explosives like “a few shells” in your airline luggage - full stop. People that do are a menace to the flying public (as well as the baggage handlers).
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…are you nearly so geographically ignorant as me? nah, 't’isn’t possible. nonetheless (TIL) “Turks and Caicos islands” are nearby the Bahamas. (and only the slightest bit whatever to do with Turkey …s’cuze-me: Türkiye)
The islands are southeast of Mayaguana in the Bahamas island chain and north of the island of Hispaniola (Haiti and the Dominican Republic). Grand Turk (Cockburn Town), the capital since 1766, is situated on Grand Turk about 1,042 kilometres (647 mi) east-southeast of Miami. They have a total land area of 430 square kilometres (170 sq mi)
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The name Caico[s] is from the Lucayan caya hico, meaning ‘string of islands’. The Turks Islands are named after the Turk’s cap cactus, Melocactus intortus, whose red cephalium resembles the fez hat worn by Turks in the late Ottoman Empire.
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Fuck that. You think it’s hard bringing explosive ordinance in either your hand or checked luggage as an American, you should try it as a dark skinned, Middle Eastern Muslim.
Much whining of poor me, little appreciation of reality.
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Given that Dubai has imprisoned visitors for as small a crime as having a literal speck of cannabis stuck on the bottom of their shoe, I feel like these people don’t have anything to complain about. Either they deliberately were bringing weapon components into a country where such things were forbidden, or they were so incredibly sloppy about packing that they had no idea what they were carrying, which is also a no-no.
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Just the people who have a No Big Deal attitude towards carrying ammo in their luggage. Turks and Caicos can’t help it if that skews American.
Any trip where I’m passing security or customs, I check my luggage completely for stuff that shouldn’t be there.
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In a small aspect i do feel bad for the impacted folk, but as bad as the consequences are it seems like preventing this seems… pretty easy? Why is anyone stashing ammo in their luggage? And if i’m travelling internationally you bet i’m checking that i don’t have anything that can cause these sorts of problems.
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It was four hunting rounds, so I’d guess that they’d previously gone on a hunting trip, were careless with a few loose rounds, never properly unpacked, then just tossed the beach stuff in on top and headed for the airport.
A harsh penalty for a careless mistake, but international borders are where you don’t want to be careless.
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I can see how a mistake like this can be made, though ammunition (and guns) are lethal/dangerous tools so the person using them needs to be vigilant over their handling.
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Ah crap. They have at least two kids. (Photo in the CBS article.) Loose ammo around the house? That little speck of sympathy is evaporating.
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Misleading photo–it was four rounds, not an entire case. One could understand how he might have missed four rounds in a carry-on (though that doesn’t excuse him–he should keep better track of ammunition), but it boggled my mind how he could have missed a full case. Turns out he didn’t.
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Most of the photos used in Boing articles do not reflect the actual imagery as copyright infringement liability is a real threat that no one wants to deal with needlessly.
Still four too many.
If one plans to travel abroad, one should know the laws of that land before getting on the plane, and then follow them accordingly.
Bottom line:
If you fuck around thinking that their rules don’t apply to you for some reason, you may find out the hard way how inaccurate that assumption really is.
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I’m glad that your crisis of confusion has passed! /s
When it comes to using stock photography vs LLM-generated imagery for posts, I’m SO grateful that BB is moving back towards stock photography. Even if the stock photos don’t exactly match every detail of the post. Because that’s what the “reading the post” part is for.
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(The pedant pendant has been discontinued.)
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Those aren’t bullets; they’re zip gun parts.
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I was getting my shoes shined at Burbank airport when a famous celebrity
Aw jeeze, you can’t just tell a story like that and not tell the whole story!
It’s just a stock photo. A stock photo with 2 live rounds and 50 spent cases. I don’t think an example of something is misleading. No one is suggesting that’s a literal photo from the story. If you jump to that conclusion, that sounds more like a media literacy problem.
Yeah, but severe punishments for either is still draconian. Fines and/or kicking them out of the country for incidental possession is reasonable and different than people trying to smuggle contraband in.
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Or maybe it’s because idiot gun-humpers who have ammunition in their luggage are more likely to be American?
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