Canadians: Have you ever been subjected to the dreaded "SSSS" screening when flying to or from the US?

In My Humble Opinion
1

For some reason, likely random, I was selected for the SSSS screening on a recent flight to the US. Out of Calgary, if that makes a difference.

For those who don’t know, the SSSS screening is a full body patdown (I felt like asking the CATSA agent why he didn’t buy me flowers and take me to dinner first, it was that intimate), and they go through pretty much everything. My computer was made operable and my recent sites were visited (including the SDMB), my phone was turned on and examined, my wallet was gone through (“And what do we have here—oh, it’s just your Alberta Health Card, and driver’s license, and Visa card, and Interac card. And $600 US and $200 Canadian.” Hey, buddy, say it louder, so the folks in the back can hear you.) and other indignities were suffered. Hell, they were digging through every pocket in my sportcoat. And my pants’ pockets while I was wearing my pants–like I said, buy me flowers and take me to dinner first.

Hell, they even looked at the losing tote tickets from the local track that I just stuff into my left rear pants pocket. They bent them, they looked at them. Fercryingoutloud!

But here’s the thing: the SSSS is an American policy, not a Canadian one. Yet I had to go through SSSS on my Lethbridge-Calgary flight (totally within Canada), and then again on my Calgary-Las Vegas flight. It is my understanding that American policy holds no weight in Canada; therefore, my Lethbridge-Calgary flight should not have carried that SSSS.

In short, I had to go through an SSSS screening twice within two hours. And once on a Canadian domestic flight!

I’m thinking of writing my MP to put a stop to this. But I thought I’d throw it out here first: Do you think that the American SSSS policy ought to be extended to Canadian domestic connecting flights to the US, or should Canada tell the US to piss off when flights within Canada connect to the US? Flights from Canada to the US can certainly be subject to SSSS, but flights within Canada, even if connecting to US-bound flights, cannot.

Your thoughts?

2

I don’t think Americans should be subjected to that, at least, not without some actual cause, much less anyone else. I’m not convinced it’s really anything but security theater.

3

Not Canadian, but here’s my story;

I got the SSSS once in 2002. I had been taking a Greyhound trip from San Diego to eastern WA (would not recommend) to visit a girl I had fallen in love with on AOL (didn’t end well but it was good while it lasted) and missed my connection in Sacramento, leaving me stranded in a strange city after midnight. I had never flown at the time, being a 19-year-old who grew up poor and had saved for six months to afford this trip on my barely above minimum wage budget, and was terrified by the notion, but seeing no better option I took a taxi to the airport and paid cash for a one-way ticket to Spokane on the earliest possible flight, which is probably what got me flagged.

I didn’t know what the letters on my ticket meant until I got pulled aside going through security and they dug through my bags and patted me down and went through my wallet. The most embarrassing parts I remember were having to explain some of my t-shirts and what I was flying for, since the notion of having an online romantic partner and travelling to meet them was still pretty out there at the time.

I didn’t fly again for another three years after that, and these days I only fly once a year or so, but it hasn’t happened again since.

4

I’ve gotten SSSS a number of times, and I’m a Trusted Traveller with a Nexus card. My experiences with it were limited to having to go through the scanner (as opposed to the magnetometer), hand wanding, pat down, and explosives screening.

5

There was exactly one time I was pleased to get the dreaded SSSS. I was flying through Miami, where as usual, there was a massive security line, and the attendant at the head of the line saw my SSSS, pulled me aside, and had me go around the line to go through the newly-implemented body scanners. Other than that, I hated it.

I don’t understand how it was applied on a Canadian domestic flight……

6

On my return from my first visit to the Caribbean (Jamaica) I was the poster boy for drugs. I was grilled nonstop for thirty minutes. I actually felt bad for the guy who went through my luggage hoping to find something that just had to be there.

I’d had a helluva good time there, but I made certain there wasn’t even a seed in my luggage. I knew I was clean, so I wasn’t the slightest bit nervous, which seemed to aggravate the situation.

7

I’ve had this treatment once, but nothing even close to what the OP describes (e.g. going through the wallet and computer).

8

I don’t know if it was SSSS, but I got pulled aside and grilled as to whether my laptop had been”in contact with chemicals.” I asked what they meant by “chemicals,” but they wouldn’t tell me except to repeat the word. We had a stand off for a while as I tried to explain what “chemical” means and why I couldn’t just say “no” or “yes” until I knew what they were asking.

As to the OP’s question, yes, write your MP. American law should not apply here.

9

I’ve been SSSSed many times before within the USA. And this was before Global Entry, Trusted Traveler, etc., even existed.

Ironically it was often applied to crewmembers since one of the indicia of suspicion was apparently a last-minute one-way booking between two cities that weren’t the passenger’s home address. Which situation happened to us multiple times per month; whenever our workflow was disrupted.

It was nothing like the OP’s experience. It was always exactly this:

And being a crew person didn’t affect it either. I’d be standing in the SSSS line ahead and behind of ordinary pax and watch them get the same treatment as myself.

Admittedly this was a few years ago. So things may’ve changed. But color me absolutely amazed at the OP’s experience.

As to this bit of the OP:

I think that the US is, or ought to be, in no place to insist that Canada perform SSSS screening on intra-Canada flights. That is, or should be, completely at Canada’s discretion.

I think as a practical matter Canada might voluntarily choose to do that for their own benefit. For two unrelated reasons:

  1. At many connecting airports passengers do not re-clear security; all arrivals and departures are within one terminal behind one security cordon. So had you been skipped at Lethbridge, and not had to change terminals and be rescreened in Calgary, you’d have never been SSSSed at all. Which would be a violation of the US/Canada joint security agreements. Simpler / safer / easier to simply screen you at your first point of entry behind the security cordon.

    Further if you do have to change terminals at your intermediate stop, that affords you an opportunity to have picked up bad stuff while you were outside the security cordon. So the second screening is not redundant. It’s looking for whatever weapons or contraband was passed to you by your evil accomplices in Calgary, that wretched hive of scum and villainy.

  2. SSSS status is issued by the US TSA’s computers based on indicia that suggest this particular traveler on this particular trip is particularly suspicious. As noted by my own experience above, the computer program that does this can be monumentally stupid. But at the same time, once in awhile it (presumably) does flag somebody troublesome. “Dumb crook” stories are real because real crooks are actually dumb. “Dumb wannabe terrorist” stories are real for the same reasons.

    Imagine you’re a bad guy intent on evil. US TSA flags you as SSSS. CATSA in Lethbridge says “Not to worry, CATSA in Calgary will screen this dude so we won’t bother. He’s Canadian, we’re Canadian, everybody on the flight is Canadian. What could go wrong, eh?” Then you proceed to make mischief and maybe kill people. I would not want to be the CATSA honcho explaining that to the press or to the Parliamentary committee investigating the aftermath in search of goats to scape. “You ignored a specific warning from US TSA that this guy was trouble and let him on an airplane to do his mayhem?”

This second item is not necessarily a good reason. But from all we all know of bureaucratic mindsets and the importance of CYA, it’s certainly an expectable reason.

10

I’m a U.S. citizen, and only fly domestically, but I still used to have it show up on my boarding pass from time to time; I’m not sure if it’s ever happened after I signed up tor TSA Pre-Check, 7 or so years ago.

It usually amounted to a pat-down, and having my bags swabbed (I assume it was for explosives residue). It seemed to mostly happen when I was flying back home to Chicago from large east-coast airports (LaGuardia, Philadelphia, etc.)

11

I got the SSSS once after missing my connection in Frankfurt, and Lufthansa rebooked me on a United flight back to the US. I’m guessing to the system it looked like I had purchased a last minute one way ticket to the US, which got me flagged. I guess I must have gotten a pat down based on other people’s stories in this thread, but I honestly don’t remember that. I just remember the gate agent pulling me aside and kind of half halfheartedly searching my carry on. It seemed like she didn’t really want to have to do it but was just going through the motions.

12

I assume this is a recent thing, but all the way back in the 80s I was returning from Canada by plane when the phony rumor was started about a terrorist assassin plot to kill Ronald Reagan. This must have been while he was under investigation for the Iran-Contra thing. Anyway, we all had to go through a pat down and carry on search before boarding the plane. This was done by US personnel in Canada which I thought somewhat unusual.

13

American and the wife was. I’ve written on the horror story that was our Air Canada trip from Greece. This was in Toronto-Pearson and she got the SSSS. Thing is, no one told her what it was. It was only when we asked the person at the gate if we could rebook our flight to avoid a long layover that she saw the SSSS and pointed out what it was. Had we not done that, it was entirely possible she would have been sent for the search as we boarded and considering it took 30 minutes, we would have missed that flight as well. Highlight of the search? She had bought a new journal. They unsealed it and looked at every page.

14

I presume the molestation on the Lethbridge-Calgary flight was because some passengers could/might remain on the plane in Calgary and thus avoid customs and immigration screening altogether, but that’s just a WAG and makes no practical sense – all the airline has to do is shoo everybody off in Calgary. Those who are continuing on to the US can be screened at that time. There’s no question about trusting the airline since the whole concept of pre-screening in Canada, which lets flights arrive in the US effectively as domestic flights, is based on trust of the entire Canadian aviation system. Sounds like someone thought it simplified or bolstered US border security and to hell with citizens and their so-called rights. I agree with your complaint about it.

As for SSSS, I didn’t even know there was such a thing. I knew about secondary screening and was subject to it only once in decades of flying, but it was nothing like what you described and was my own damn fault anyway. I was flying to a business meeting and was asked who was paying me. The simple answer was “my Canadian employer”. But instead I launched into a convoluted story about being a consultant and that the meeting was with a US consulting firm that was on contract to a Canadian company and as I rattled on I could see the immigration agent’s eyes glaze over and I could almost imagine a fuse blowing in her little brain and smoke coming out her ears, and she duly dispatched me to secondary. At which point, having had a chance to collect my thoughts, I gave the second agent a somewhat more lucid explanation, which caused him to look at me in some perplexity and ask, “why on earth did they send you here?”. I simply replied, “obviously the agent didn’t understand me”.

15

SSSS is totally a TSA post-911 invention.

As to US personnel in Canada, some major Canadian airports allow US customs, immigration, and TSA to operate there. So in effect once at the airport you process out of Canadian emigration into limbo then process into the US system while trapped in a departure lounge in Canada. The eventual airplane arrival into the USA can then be treated as if it came from a domestic US city.

The upside for Canada is that the Canadian airport and Canadian airlines can offer service to US destinations that are not equipped for international arrivals. Which is most of them. IOW, absent this a flight could not run Toronto-Des Moines since there’s no ICE in Des Moines to accept the passengers. So the flight would have to stop in Chicago to clear customs. Yuck! Who wants that? By doing ICE in Toronto instead they can fly directly to Des Moines and let the people just walk off into the USA.

A few Caribbean island destinations have the same arrangements for the same reasons. It greatly expands their access to the US tourism market at the small “insult” of ceding a few thousand square feet of terminal space to US government authorities. From whom they probably collect a hefty rent.

16

Well, if I had stayed on the plane in Calgary, I would have ended up back in Lethbridge. It’s just a Dash-8 that shuttles between the two cities. You can’t really fly anywhere on scheduled service from Lethbridge except Calgary, so people on that flight are either going to Calgary or connecting somewhere.

Here’s how it works: I fly from Lethbridge to Calgary, going through a regular Canadian security screening at YQL. I arrive in Calgary (YYC), and head for the US Departure gates. This entails actually going outside into the unsecure public area and re-entering through another security checkpoint. US Departures have their own terminal at YYC, so they have their own security checkpoint.

It’s still staffed by CATSA, but this screening is done to American standards. Pretty much the same as Canadian, but this time, shoes have to be off and run through the scanner. (Domestic flights within Canada, and overseas flights do not require shoes off.) Normally, that’s the only difference, but it’s enough of one that it requires a whole 'nother screening—you can’t just get off your flight from YQL (or wherever) and head off to US Customs.

Anyway, still in Calgary, you go through the standard American security screening, then you go to US Customs, then you go into the US Departure terminal, where the gates are. As @LSLGuy pointed out, this is a feature of many Canadian airports, so we can fly to places in the US where the arrival airport might not have US Customs.

So, two different flights: one totally domestic (YQL - YYC), and one transborder (YYC - LAS for me, this trip).

I should note that the return trip is much easier. You land in Calgary, go through Canada Customs, and follow the signs for connecting flights. No need for a second security screening.

17

My apologies, I had completely conflated “security screening” with “US immigration screening”. Now that I understand what you were saying, my previous post didn’t even make sense! :grimacing:

Now that I understand the situation, I’ll say that I still agree with you that this was odd and rather outrageous, but I’ll make a couple of WAGs. When you say “… the SSSS is an American policy, not a Canadian one. Yet I had to go through SSSS on my Lethbridge-Calgary flight (totally within Canada)” I’m not sure if that’s quite true because CATSA states that random additional screening is a legally mandated part of their function. I don’t think they’re doing anything here on behalf of the US.

The apparently more rigourous security screening in Calgary might just be local airport policy rather than something the US demands for US-bound flights, but I don’t really know. If it is US policy, it’s something they would have to enforce at every airport in the world that has US-bound flights, which I doubt would be practical, and many of those countries would likely tell them to blow it out their ear. But if we’re letting the US dictate our security screening policies, I do think it’s something we should be calling out and objecting to.

ETA: Article that touches on the subject of the TSA attempting to mandate certain screening standards for US-bound flights from overseas airports:

18

Hey, no problem. I figured that was what you were talking about. I’ve flown to the US on business before, and been quizzed on that, but it was always to a training session in one of our US offices, and the trainer was an American, and I was attending to do nothing more than learn. Generally, no problem, once I explained that.

A good WAG, and CATSA’s additional screening is something I’ve been subjected to a few times. Typically, it involves swabbing my computer for something, or turning on my phone or opening my briefcase and looking in, or getting the wand out because I forgot to take off my watch. But that’s always seemed to be an ad hoc decision by the CATSA people at the checkpoint. At any rate, such searches have never been as intrusive as what I went through in Lethbridge and Calgary recently.

I agree. I have no problem with the US dictating conditions for flights leaving Canada and going to a US destination (“shoes off,” for example), and even the “SSSS” screening. But when it comes to domestic flights within Canada, like my YQL - YYC one, the US should have no say.

19

By way of clarification from a Canadian desperately trying to hang on to what’s left of our sovereignty, the TSA does not operate in Canada. :wink: Granted, however, that this thread raises the open question of how much they may influence their Canadian counterpart, CATSA. The TSA has no connection to the presence of the US CPB in Canada for pre-clearance.

Pre-clearance has all sorts of advantages for passengers and airlines besides being able to fly into US airports without CPB services, or at least without such services at scale. It’s generally faster than the alternative because passenger arrival is more spread out at origin than at the destination where the whole planeload is dumped at once, it allows airlines to use cheaper gates and shorter time windows for connecting flights, and it offloads congestion from US airports onto the originating airports. It also saves airlines a big headache in the event of a passenger being refused entry.

20

Thanks for this correction. I rarely get to Canada and so mis-remembered.

At at least some of the Caribbean destinations I mentioned, they do use US TSA rather than host country screeners. At least for the segregated terminal used exclusively for departures to the US. I don’t fly from those islands to places other than the US, so I don’t know what they use for screening standards or screening personnel at their other terminal(s). Presumably it’s all local folks following local regs.