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I just got back home from a 10 day trip to the US. It's amazing how horrid the mega-US airports have become. On one hand, with the TSA's insistence on individually screening shoes, computers and toothpaste, there needs to be re-screening when transiting from international to domestic flights. I've never been asked to take off my shoes or remove my laptop at NRT, though, this time I was asked if the liquids in my carry-on met the US requirements, but they weren't individually screened. So, I'll guess that there is no international requirement for US bound flights to strictly follow the US procedure.
Interestingly, regardless how busy the ticket counters are at NRT, I've never hand to wait longer than about 5 minutes to get to the security gate. I'm sure that's not always the case, but when was the last time you had less that a 5 minute wait at ORD, or LAX?
My other observation is that Patrick's experience with the minutiae of baggies of indeterminate size and rolled up toothpaste seems to be more common that you would think. Between the security gates at ORD and ATL, I witnessed four instances of people either haggling with the TSA folks over a tube of lipstick, hand creme or some hair product, or outright crying over them, because they didn't fit the size or baggie requirements of TSA. One lady was literally brought to tears over having to part with a tube of expensive "medicated" lotion because her baggie was the wrong size. I was amazed.
Maybe it's more of a problem of airport size. My mother routinely flies out of Newark and sees that sort of thing often, but other family members fly out of MHT and rarely have a problem. Regardless, the time is clearly nigh for the US to craft a comprehensive approach to screening and airport security management...
haha...Like that'll happen in my lifetime. 'eh.
