Backcountry Pilot

[TrevDog offline]

Here tis. Laurier washington, 69S. Zoom in on the runway and you can see the north end is in the great white north. There is a customs station on the highway next to the airstrip.

http://maps.google.com/maps?ll=48.99837 ... 599%20(69S)

yes I love it! 69S so you land there and just as long as you are on the ground roll when you cross the border you are really driving across right? now we just need to find one going into Alaska and we are set.

[Christina Young offline]

So if the airplane is packed on a tractor trailer being shipped to Alaska on the highway, the truckdriver needs to file on eAPIS?

Seems like this would be the same situation as being towed across the border. BTW, what would you do for crew? Just list no crew or passengers for the "flight"... which is not a flight at all?

[Rhyppa offline]

Christinia and Trev Dog - I'm just relaying what was told at the informational meeting by the Customs agent. I'm sure if the plane was disassembled and on a truck eAPIS does apply. But landing and taxiing across the border will not work, whether on land or water, $5000 fine first time, $10,000 the second. It might get you around the transponder issue, but not eAPIS. If you are traveling in an aircraft and need to clear customs, customs needs to be notified of your arrival via the eAPIS system. Hopefully everyone complaining about eAPIS here took the time a year and a half ago to call/write/email their congressman and senators when this ridiculuous law was first proposed and had the open comment period. Seems like a lot of people sit on their hands until these crazy ideas become law, then complain about it.

[Christina Young offline]

If you are traveling in an aircraft and need to clear customs, customs needs to be notified of your arrival via the eAPIS system. Hopefully everyone complaining about eAPIS here took the time a year and a half ago to call/write/email their congressman and senators when this ridiculuous law was first proposed and had the open comment period. Seems like a lot of people sit on their hands until these crazy ideas become law, then complain about it.

From my understanding, eAPIS is not to notify customs - it is to give you permission to cross the border. Doesn't customs still need to be notified separately?

I certainly did complain to my congressmen and comment during the open comment period. But it does not matter, because the bureaucrats are in charge now. These guys are not accountable to voters and are virtually impossible to get rid of.

I guess I will find out next week how well this eAPIS thing works when you don't have immediate internet access crossing the border. I should probably file my manifests today while I have online access.

[Rhyppa offline]

eAPIS serves two purpose near as I can tell, first, and supposedly most important, is it gives the names of all on board to DHS to scrub against the no-fly bad guy list, and second, it notifies your intended customs arrival station of your impending arrival, and who is on board. You still must notify customs in advance just like always of your arrival - typically your 1 hour call, nothing has changed with that. However, the customs agent will now have a complete printout of your flight manifest in his hand when he comes to your plane, the exact same manifest that you submitted on eAPIS. He will then check that eAPIS manifest against those actually on board, to verify that everyone on board was submitted for approval to eAPIS. You can have less people on board than you submitted to eAPIS, but everyone on board must have been submitted to eAPIS. eAPIS does not change or modify of delete anything you had to do last year to cross the border, it is in addition to everything you had to do before. You still file flight plans, you still notify customs in advance, you still need a customs decal, everyone on board still needs a passport, and you still fill out your arrival form to give to the customs agent. eAPIS is in addition to all of that. As assanine as it eAPIS is, it actually is pretty easy to use the website once you've tried it one time. Hopefully they will fine tune the website to allow you to memorize data for future filings, and amend or cancel filings. Like I said in previous posts, the customs station I use at Crane Lake MN has indicated they will be lenient and understanding of weather delays, and don't necessarily expect a phone call to indicate you will be late since the majority of the planes crossing in there come from remote no-phone areas. Other stations may not be so lenient. Christinia you are right, bureaucrats are running the show, but I think if enough senators/reps would raise hell with DHS and TSA, this thing along with the TSA identification requirements would be toned down. But until constituents raise hell with their politicians, this won't happen.

[steve offline]

I did my first border crossing yesterday since the e-APIS system went into effect. I first went through the tutorial and then filled out the form. I made a couple of mistakes which the system brought to my attention and were corrected. When asked for airport of departure it would not accept the nearest one to the lake I was taking off from (Park Rapids, MN), as it was not listed in the choices available. I called AOPA and got help. The answer to that question, is to put down the nearest airport with customs to were you will be crossing the border and then explain in the comments section. Hope that helps some of you that might get stumped with that one also. I did file the e-APIS the day before at home and used the computor at the airport the next day, to get the reciept and print it out, so I don't know how long it took for the reply. I got lucky and the times worked out, but it was still a pain.

Rhyppa: This was the first time I used Sand Point as a port of entry. It is my new favorite. Steve

[M6RV6 offline]

Sorry it has taken so long to reply, but have not taken the time to do much other than read a few posts.
All the whining I did before I left was just that!! I know it is a pain in the a&* and kind of a infringement on us all!!!
We had a good trip up, called CANPASS before we left and gave them our arrival time and all the info they wanted. Opened our flight plan and got our discreet code to cross the border and left.
Made good time to Prince George so had to call and notify customs of early arrival,(CA doesn't mind if you use your cell) taxied to customs and called, they gave us a #, we fueled up and headed to Dease Lake, Spent the night there(pretty expensive gas) went back and flew the Stikine Canyon (pretty Awesome)and flew to Atlin( One of the NICEST places Ive ever been) the people there are fantastic, on to White Horse.
Spent the night there (stayed at the Blue Sky, nice place, Had to say that they upgraded us to a Suite)tho you can stay above the fuel place for free, but probably not with your wife!!!?
On to Dawson for a few hours of being a tourist, caught a ride to town with a local miner who flew in a 206, Great place very mining and touristy?? $20 bucks for a ride back to the airport(only one cab).
Headed to Northway, called from Dawson, took 5 times on the pay phone to get thru, notified them we would be 1 hour early, then figured out we were on Pacific time still not AK time so was 2 hours early, but the agent was in Northway so OK
There is no computer access in Whitehorse or Dawson so make sure you fill out your departure and arrival manifests before you go, helps to print it and have paper in hand.
The agent was very nice and helpful and said they were being pretty lenient as they know there is no access in CA.
She wanted to see my pilots license, medical, registration, then went over the plane with a giger counter?? The old bird still has some lead based paint on it so it chriped pretty loud, but she let us be on our way.
All in all pretty painless. But still a pain in the A#&$^
GT
PS had severe clear all the way to Anc. first time in 30 years!!!

[Rhyppa offline]

I've used eAPIS 3 times in the past month, it has worked without a glitch. I am finding that from the time I hit the submit button on the website, head right to my email program, I already have back approval. It is that quick, usually less than 5 minutes, sometimes less than 2 minutes. Again, not defending the system, but the website and process works as advertised. And Steve is right on picking the airport, you must pick your departure airport from the popdown list, and there isn't many on that list. Just pick the nearest airport off the list, even if its a 100 mile away. Then on the next line type in your exact departure point. One other thing, you don't need to complete the customs entry form anymore and present it to the customs agent on your arrival, since all this information is already included on the eAPIS form. I just wish the APIS system would allow you to copy your departure manifest into the arrival manifest, so you wouldn't have to retype that information. That, and they should allow you to edit a plan online, to change arrival/departure times.

[chickenair offline]

O.K. I'm getting ready to do this in a week. I registered with e-APIS. Where the confusion comes in for me is wether or not I need thr Customs Decal? The way I read that deal didn't make much sense to me. So do all you border hoppers have the Customs Decal.

[Rhyppa offline]

Absolutely positively need the customs decal. AS a matter of fact, it is required input when you file your manifest in eAPIS. You can print out the receipt online that gives you the decal number. The decal takes about a week in the mail.

[chickenair offline]

OK I bought my Customs Decal 2 days ago. I haven't gotten an official receipt with my decal # yet. How long did it take to get the "Official email receipt"??
So today I was at the airport and 2 Homeland Security Officers from Bellingham came by. I stopped and quizzed them on this subject. THEY said I don't need the decal??? I don't think the gov-r-mint even know what they are requiring. So maybe the $27.50 will keep me out of jail. What they did say was Canada doesn't really care, its for getting back into the US.

[Rhyppa offline]

Chickenair, you could have printed out your confirmation of the decal purchase which includes your decal number when you purchased it online. I think the final screen is the confirmation, and you can choose to print it out. I'm guessing you can log back in to your decal account and print out the receipt, worst case call the help number listed on the decal web page and they will tell you how to print it. This printed confirmation will work until you have the decal in hand. I don't recall receiving an email from DHS as a receipt, since you can print it out during the purchase process. Also, my email spam filter was blocking out all government emails - including DHS. I needed to add dhs.gov to the white list on my filter so I could get email confirmations from eAPIS. The DHS officer's were absolutely wrong, and exemplifies what is so screwed up with this whole system. The left hand of the gov't hasn't a clue what the right hand is doing. You absolutely positively need the decal number to file on eAPIS, and when you clear US Customs inbound they will confirm that decal number. Since you may not have the sticker on the plane, the printout will suffice. Canadian Customs does not care about the decal, as this is strictly a US thing. One correction to a prior post I made is that now with eAPIS, you no longer need the entry form -I forget what number form this is- but it was the one page form you used to list your manifest on and handed to the customs officer when you landed. Since this old form is now a duplicate of info customs already has with eAPIS, that hand written form is no longer used. Confirmed with US Customs last Saturday when I entered US at Crane Lake MN.

[M6RV6 offline]

Chicken
When I came thru Northway, She was pretty level headed about the whole thing, she just wanted the print of the order for the decal and was ok with what I had.
Good Luck
GT

[TrevDog offline]

I listened to this podcast and I hope this is just customs learning and not going to be standard.

[chickenair offline]

I don't know if the guys on this thread have read my Sportsman 2+2 thread, so I'll post the results of my trip back to Alaska. I printed out my receipt for the Decal and filed my manifest on E-AFIS and got my comfirmation # from them. I called from Whitehorse to ammend my arrival time and they told me I didn't exist in the system? They wanted me to find a computer and re-file on E-AFIS. I told them I had a confirmation # and the Customs guy said their computer doesn't play with the E-AFIS computer. And again told me I had to find a computer and re-file. I told him I was not spending the night in Whitehorse. I did everything I was supposed to do and it wasn't my fault they couldn't find me in the system. Told them either to check me thru Customs at Northway like the good law abiding US Citizen I'm trying to be or I'm just going to fly home. If I'm not in the system, no one will know I was there. So he told me to come into Northway and he checked me thru Customs and filled out a Non-compliance with E-AFIS form. He said they won't fine you until the 3rd screw up. But this shouldn't even count as a screw-up on my part! Hey, maybe if they screw-up 3 times we can get them to go away
I also attached a note to the form with my Confirmation #