Sorry I am a little late on this post guys, this is what I faced on Saturday (why Phil posted the other thread) and before I start, I would like to thank Phil for all his efforts and hard work regarding this on going situation.
Well, I must say within the past month or so my experience up there has been much more pleasant and different when it came time to face security, which led me to believe MAYBE something was said that they are actually being understanding. One perfect example was about a month ago, I was up there for a while by my self and I was approached by security and when asked if I was taking photos, I truthfully replied yes and after a few minutes of chatting she was on her way down with 0 problems and I continued to do my thing till the end of the day.
Last weekend on Saturday 8-10 there was about 6-7 of us there for the whole afternoon and again security did not care what so ever and the following day I was there again alone for over 4 hours till sun down and 0 problems.
2 days ago after about an hour or so I was approached by a few loud honks of the security car. I got out of my truck and approached hers which the usual Hellos and such. Right away she tells me that there is no photography allowed. The whole time I am trying to talk to her as an adult but she was on a one track mind and throwing the usual bull **** of "with everything that is going on" and my reply was, what is going on ? please do tell me. At this point she got on her radio and messaged " I have someone up here that is telling me he is talking photos of the airport", I asked her to correct her self by saying that, "I am taking photos of the planes, not the airport" which she did repeat back on the radio. At this point I was told that her supervisor would come and explain it better to me which I kindly said please do, I will be by my truck.
About a half hour later I see a port supervisor vehicle and the security car come back up but stay on the other side of the parking lot, the supervisor was out of her car just looking around. Few minutes later I see a PAPD vehicle come up and the officer was just chatting with them. Once I saw him approaching my car I was out there waiting for him even before he got to me and I gave him the friendly wave right away and walk over to his passenger side window. This Officer was the BIGGEST gentleman and made it pleasure to speak to him from the start:
Good afternoon officer, how are you today ?
Pretty good, your self? Whats going on, I was told you are taking photos?
Yes sir, it is my hobby and today is a pretty nice day out so I am just taking advantage and enjoying it up here.
Gotcha, Can I see some of the pics that are in your camera? And let me get your ID as well
Of course here is my ID, let me grab my camera. (started showing him the last shots I took and after 4-5 he was satisfied)
Well, these are pretty nice photos and I see you are telling me the truth in every way but in this case I have to ask you to leave today and that is because she (the security) is claiming you were arguing with her, you seem like a really nice guy but there are 2 sides to the story
There was never an argument, I was just trying to talk and explain my self but she was not having it
Again I know and I hear you. But this is what I have to do for today
No problem sir, I respect you and your decision. May I ask you a question that I personally have been waiting to ask from one of you guys for a while now?
Sure please
Are we allowed to be taking photos up here? and aren't you the highest authority to make the decision as to if I can stay or not in this case?
Yes, I do have the last saying and I have to say she is right, you are NOT allowed to take photos up here technically
At this point, I was not going to argue and get into it with him since he was super cool and respected me and I wanted to respect him in every way back so I just stopped right there.
He noted my name down from my ID on his pad, we just spoke for a few more minutes, shook his hand a couple of times, thanked him and was on my way.
Even though it was a nice experience with this officer, I still got mixed messages regarding the rules hence why Phil posted what he has from them so far.
My personal conclusion, the problem is the security and not port!
Interesting, about a couple of hours later at the mounds an NYPD cruiser was just passing by and I gave a friendly wave and they stopped and chatted like we were friends. Asking about SLR cameras and which one they should choose for a beginner and just shooting the **** about whatever came to our head. At one point one officer even said, do you have any clue how many calls we get regarding you guys taking pics of the planes ? We know its cool and you guys are not doing anything wrong and by now we know all the exact locations. They hung out for a good 10 minutes and took off because they got a call ! It felt real good that what we do is known by these guys and they already know it is a hobby and not a threat.
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