L23
Active Member
That's not a surprise. I recall flying out of Heathrow a few days after the El Al terror attacks in Europe. There was a lot of heavy armoured vehicles surrounding the airport, and soldiers wandering through the terminal carrying (in their hands) automatic weapons. I expect Pearson and Ottawa International are quite sedate in comparison.
I moved to the US just after 9/11. Lots of security around then. I was told to expect much longer than normal time for going through immigration, that there'd be much more stringent checks on all my paperwork, likely interviews (multiple) and all sorts of other stuff.
The actual process? I walked up, with my passport and visa letter, he looked at them for about 5 seconds, stamped them and said "welcome to America." That was it.