cook stoves in south america

Hey all,

Just looking for some general info on experiences with cook stoves and travelling to South America (Patagonia, mostly). I have a Whisperlite international and a pocket rocket what I am thinking about bringing on a trip next month. Have people had difficulties getting stoves or fuel bottles through security? Also, can you find canisters for a pocket rocket? I burned a lot of unleaded fuel in my Whisperlite in Europe, but do prefer white gas if available. Can you find it? Thanks for any info.

White gas stoves are hard to get through security. You need to call the FAA, escalate to a supervisor, and get them to fax you a letter with their signature and contact information saying its ok to bring a clean stove with no fuel residue/smell. With that, you'll be ok, but without it you run a big gamble. If you try to sneak it in, it will most likely be confiscated and there is a small possibility of being prosecuted. You may need to call the FAA a few times to find someone who is understanding.

You'll need either a brand new stove, or one that is very clean and absolutely does not smell like fuel. Fuel bottles have to be new.

Butane stoves are no problem to check in(though it is still good idea to get the FAA letter for safety), but fuel canisters are of course not possible to bring with you.

My experiences finding fuel have been in Ecuador and Mendoza Argentina - no beta for Patagonia. In Mendoza, white gas and butane cartridges are no problem to find - there are camping/mountaineering stores that carry it. Its a bit harder in Ecuador, but possible in Quito. There are some camping stores in new town that sometimes have canisters, and a big hardware store just north of Amazonas in new town that has had white gas and canisters.

A good possibility for MSR style fuel bottles is to try to buy them from people just getting done with trips. It isn't as big a hassle to bring them back to the USA as it is to get them south, but still a good chance for them to go missing when TSA searches your bag if you have a connection. I've generally just given away my MSR fuel bottles to locals or incoming climbers.

Thanks for the info, Andrew. It's very helpful.

is this for carry on bags or checked bags? do you still need the letter if you are checking a stove?

Canisters were becoming available pretty easily a few years ago in El Chalten, but it still may be safer to stock up in El Calafate. And "white gas" was easily found but was called solvent or cleaner in some places. With my fuel bottles I rubbed soap into the threads and they passed the smell test and flew with ease. Bring several stoves to cover all angles.

you need the letter to get them onto an airplane at all.

Letter as of when, just out of curiousity...

I flew to Seattle with a jetboil carryon in October and had no problems leaving SLC, but leaving SEA to return to SLC, the TSA nazi spent over 5 minutes smelling it and passing it from TSA clone to TSA clone trying to get a positive gas smell, then returned it to me.

He said he was a backpacker and would love to have a stove like that...

so anyway, I didn't have a letter then and wondered if something had changed since then?

You can get on without a letter, but you have a very good chance of getting the stove confiscated and a small chance of being prosecuted for trying to sneak a banned item through security. If you have the letter from the FAA, you are almost certainly able to get your stove through without it being a problem.

Feel free to try to get by without if you feel lucky. I didn't have one because I never knew you could do this before I went to Argentina 6 or so years ago, and we ended up missing our flight while we begged and pleaded with the agent and then the FAA on the phone to let us on with a stove that didn't smell like fuel. We got lucky and were able to get the letter from the FAA at the last second and then stand by on a later flight, but it definitely had the potential to fuck up our trip completely.

I've since always gotten the letter before I fly, and i've had no troubles on several flights to Mexico, Ecuador, and Peru.

http://www.tsa.dhs.gov/travelers/airtravel/assistant/editorial_1187.shtm

I printed this up in case I had issues - mentions that a stove is "legal" and can travel with you as long as it is clean.

That's why I elected carry-on - so that I could verify that my nose, and possibly a dozen other volunteer noses, could not detect a smell, whereas if it was checked it was totally up to the backpacking TSA nazi as to whether it was clean, which of course without my presence would depend on his future camping ambitions.

I'm confused as to why I would be prosecuted for carrying a "legal" item on board. Do you have a link from a reputable government source explaining that the above link from the TSA is incorrect and the stove is in fact illegal and requires a letter from the Pilot, Plane, and Air Traffic Controller licensing organization?

Thanks.

That is a good link to have - maybe as good as the FAA letter if you print it out and keep it with you.

Keep in mind that the TSA guys and ticketing agents are generally poorly trained and not really encouraged to take much initiative, and that regulations and standards are different from place to place. Stoves are in the display cases of banned items at some airports(DIA for sure when I flew to Argentina a few years ago, others too though i don't recall which for sure).

Bottom line, do everything you can to stack the odds in your favor. I got denied boarding on a flight to Argentina and I know 2 others who have had stoves confiscated without warning. Arguing with an official at an airport is a bad scene, so just go prepared and you'll be better off. If you think travel regulations are always rational - especially post 9/11, you must not travel much. I fly 40+ times a year, so i've learned not to tempt fate.

For work I fly about twice a month. For recreation I fly about ten times a year, including international. So yeah, I have seen a lot - hence the printout and request for lots of noses.

I've been the token white-boy for the macarena dance to the mag-wand several times.

I've seen TSA clones divying up expensive makeup after confiscating it. I've had them hassle me over an empty nalgene, but on the other hand, I've taken a full nalgene through.

For work I often travel with camera equipment, and I've had to take it all apart and send it through again, and have the little bomb-cloth wiped all over it repeatedly. I've been pulled out of the line and almost violently accosted over a studio microphone that looked enough like a grenade to have the red light flashing.

So yeah, I actually do have some experience.

Sorry to question your flight experience, but the asking for a dozen noses thing from the TSA just seems like a wildly unreasonable expectation to have. Many TSA personnel are of course courteous and helpful, but when you get the little napolean type of TSA guy there just isn't that much you can do unless you are really willing to miss your flight or leave your stove behind. I'm not - especially on a big mountaineering trip to South America, so I like to fight bureaucracy with bureaucracy. Its worked for me every time without asking for a dozen noses, and it is a course of action recommended to me by a ticketing agent supervisor at Denver International Airport.

It sounds like you have had bad experiences with the TSA as well, and in that case it seems like you should see the value in having everything you can to make something happen that is a total judgement call with the TSA and ticketing agents. Having the phone number of a guy at the FAA who faxed you a letter of authorization is a pretty good trump card, and in my opinion carries more weight than a print out from the internet from an agency who changes their rules weekly. I'm not sure why you are so hellbent against thinking its not another good tool in the quiver.

TSA makes me nuts. I almost got in a fight with a TSA guy who got in my face after I challenged him on confiscating some fudge from my wife. He said it was a "liquid or gel" and I said it was "food". Of course I lost but this guy had the most attitude of any TSA person I've ever seen. He bowed up, puffed his chest out, spread his arms and tryed to crazy eye me like he was back in da hood. It was a bad scene.

In my experience TSA is completely incompetent. I took a trip to DC with just a cary on and when I got there discovered that I had one of my switchblades in the bag by accident. I got it through security on the way back as well. In Vegas, the TSA nazi grabbed my buddys' backpack because the x ray showed something, his tiny climbing knife. The TSA guy couldn't figure out how to open the backpack, and my buddy didn't offer any help, so the guy just gave it back to him without ever even opening the thing. Truly a pathetic agency that only provides the image of security.

My favorite is when the sheep at large say:

"But we're so much safer now"

well, no, actually, the statistical mean of your likelihood to die on any one flight has been essentially static for about 30 years.

Because if someone tells me I'm safer, I assume that means I have less chance of dieing.