ATLANTA-
Travelers showed up at airports with toiletries stored in zip-top plastic bags Tuesday as they tried to comply with new security rules allowing them to carry on small amounts of liquids and gels.
“I was thrilled to hear yesterday that actually you can carry mascara on the plane,” said Val Chamberlain of Atlanta, who showed security screeners a plastic bag filed with mascara and small toiletries.
Beginning Tuesday, passengers can carry lotions and gels onto airliners again after a six-week ban–but only in tiny containers of 3 ounces or less and only if they’re in clear zip-top plastic bags.
Travelers can also buy drinks or other liquids or gels at shops inside airport security checkpoints and carry them on board under the partially relaxed anti-terror rules.
Jim Smith of the Transportation Security Administration said most passengers at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport came prepared and brought toiletries in plastic bags. But others who hadn’t heard the news were rummaging through their carry-on bags as they neared security points, discarding items too large to bring onboard.
Pat Henderson, of Palm Coast, Fla., was among those who did not want to bother with the new guidelines, throwing away the deodorant and toothpaste in his carry-on before entering the security check line.
“It’s not worth the hassle,” he said. “I just don’t want to deal with it.”
By 8 a.m., a trash bin at a TSA checkpoint was three feet deep with discarded water bottles and 16-ounce bottles of toiletries, including shaving gel and hand lotion.
The new guidelines require items to be stored in one-quart bags, but TSA officials in Atlanta allowed passengers to board planes with items stored in one-gallon bags since Tuesday was the first day the new rules were being enforced.
If a passenger brings a container larger than 3 ounces, it still must be put in checked baggage. Up to 4 ounces of a few items were permitted in carry-on bags: eye drops, saline solution, nonprescription medicine and personal lubricants.
The outright ban on liquids, lotions and gels, ordered Aug. 10 after an alleged plot to bomb U.S.-bound jetliners was foiled, is no longer needed, Transportation Security Administration chief Kip Hawley said Monday.
After testing a variety of explosives, the FBI and other laboratories found that tiny amounts of substances–so small they fit into a quart-size plastic bag–can’t blow up an airliner.
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