From the Iberia website

< If you fly to a final destination with a transfer in any UK airport you will not be able to check your luggage to final destination. You have to pick up your luggage at the UK airport and you will be subject to a check by Immigrations Control, after which the luggage must be checked in again. >

www.iberia.com/OneToOne/v3/news.do

Hi A,

Is that for Spanish citizens or any one flying Iberia?

Is it something new?

The link didn't work for me.

Thanks for this info. Oddly, there's nothing about it on the BAA website. Can we be sure it's 100% accurate?

Can we assume it's 100% accurate?

Well, if Iberia say that's their policy (or confused, knee-jerk panic reaction), then that very probably is their policy.

But it's not anyone else's. While these things are in constant flux, there's not a shred of evidence right now for Alan's alarmist headline.

And there probably won't be. The current scare is about cabin baggage. The secondary problem is the widespread disruption all this is causing. It's very unlikely any responsible airline (a category that clearly doesn't include Iberia) would want to add to te chaos by creating unnecessary checking in of hold baggage.

This is now Air Canada's policy too. The way it's presented, it's the idea of the UK authorities:

http://www.aircanada.com/en/news/travel_advisory1.html

Hi

Yes this happened to me before at Heathrow. I travelled one week after 9/11. I was on my way to Rome via Heathrow and I had to check my luggage in again. It was an absolute pain. Queues of people. Needless to say I missed my connecting flight. Make sure you have a few hours up - you're gonna need it!

Thanks everyone. We're flying BA to Berlin through London in less than a month, so I would like to know. We've got 3 hours between our flights. I think I'll give BA a call a week or two before we leave and see what their policy is.

&quot;<i>It's very unlikely any responsible airline . . . . would want to add to te chaos by creating unnecessary checking in of hold baggage.</i>&quot;

This is one of the few (very) times flanner has got it wrong. Same exact thing happened back in 2001. Through checking was suspended - I assume because BAA couldn't oversee the quality of screening at the initial aiprport. (wasn't Lockerbie caused by a through-checked bag?)

pavfec: we were posting at the same time. In this case, no airline will be able to have their own independent policy on this. If BAA says there is no through checking there is no through checking.

Things <i>might</i> ease up by the time of your trip - but for now count on having to retrieve/re-check the bags.

Well, the responsible British ministry (the Dept of Transport) is still saying &quot;There are no changes to current hold baggage security measures.&quot; And neither BA (the largest carrier out of he UK) nor BAA (the largest airport operator) make any mention of this.

I suspect Air Canada and Iberia are getting confused. Right now, they may well have decided it'd be foolish for them to through-check because Heaven knows when or if the connecting plane will take off. That doesn't mean through checking's been abolished.

The moral of which, it seems to me, is that all this is highly fluid, lots of operators are making lots of different decisions and the only thing that';s certain is that practically everything's unpredictable. Trust no-one. Not even me.

We have had to do this since 9/11 if we are flying to or from NYC via LAX - Sydney on the Qantas flights. We have to disembark, pick up our luggage, and have our luggage screened again before we check back in.

janisj: But I haven't seen a notice from BAA that there's no through checking! There's nothing on their website about it, which is why I'm wondering how accurate this info really is.

I guess we'll just have to wait and see what happens. All this is still very fresh, so perhaps there'll be a change in the coming weeks (like hopefully letting passengers take one book on board!).