This Wendover Productions video was made possible
by Hover. Get 10% off your custom domain or email from
Hover with the code “Wendover” at checkout. So here’s the question: let’s say you
hop on a plane from New York to Amsterdam then transfer onto a plane to Cape Town, South
Africa. Upon arrival in Amsterdam, passengers just
pop out into the terminal and then reboard the next plane. You never would have gone through passport
control, so which country were you in during your connection? The simple answer is the Netherlands, but
you weren’t in the same Netherlands as people in downtown Amsterdam. The international zone of airports is part
of the country in which it is physically located, more or less. It almost operates as a separate country because
a border control agent would say you weren’t in the Netherlands but a police officer would
say you were. You were in the Netherlands in a legal sense
but not in an immigration sense. This can create complications. Chinese citizens, for example, don’t need
a visa to transfer from one flight to another through Amsterdam Schiphol Airport but they
do need a visa to enter the Netherlands. If a Chinese citizen without a visa commits
a crime in Amsterdam Airport that crime must be tried Dutch court, but if they don’t
have a visa the Chinese offender can’t legally enter the Netherlands. The country therefore has the rather amazing
ability to create a floating international zone around the Chinese Citizen—no matter
where they go, they are not in the Netherlands even if they are walking down the streets
of Amsterdam. They will never have gone through passport
control or had their passport stamped but they’ll still be in the Netherlands physically. Of course, though, they’ll always be in
the captivity of police officers. The question of what country you’re in in
airports can get a little more complicated thanks to the USA. The US operates a unique system of customs
pre-clearance facilities at a number of airports and some train stations and ports around the
world. Essentially, when flying from Dublin to New
York, for example, you clear US customs in Dublin so that once you arrive in New York
you can immediately walk strait out of the airport with no further checks just like a
domestic traveller. So, once you pass through US customs in Ireland
you’re in the US in an immigration-sense, but here’s where it gets tricky. You’re in the US, but you’re not on US
soil. Irish laws still apply past US customs in
Dublin airport. Of course, there are exceptions. The US border agents working the facility
are, on the other hand, subject to US laws despite being in Ireland. They are essentially treated like diplomats. Crime is pretty rare in airports so this doesn’t
normally cause problems, but consider this. There’s a pre-clearance facility in Abu
Dhabi Airport in the United Arab Emirates…. where homosexuality is illegal and can be
punished with fines, prison time, or worse. That means that if you got a little frisky
past US customs in Abu Dhabi Airport, you could technically be arrested while in the
US for being gay. Of course this would never happen because
it would create a diplomatic incident of monumental proportions, but the point is that it could
happen. Speaking of diplomacy, more jurisdictional
fuzziness comes with the United Nations headquarters in New York. The territory this building is on is technically
international territory—not part of the US. In general US laws apply, but the UN can,
at their own discretion make their own laws that trump US law. For example, the UN headquarters in New York
is allowed to issue stamps and run their own postal service for its employees—something
that would be illegal in the US. There are more ways to visit countries without
going through immigration. Back in the 40’s, Russia and Estonia re-drew
their border and ended up making a bit of a peninsula of Russia jutting out into Estonia
between the towns of Lutepää and Sesniki. As a part of the Soviet Union, it wasn’t
a problem for Estonia to build the road between the two villages through the peninsula since
the borders were rather porous. When the Soviet Union fell, though, the border
became one of the most guarded in the world and therefore Sesniki was cut off from the
rest of Estonia. So, Russia decided to allow cars to drive
the short route with no border controls, no paperwork, nothing as long as they don’t
stop. Border agents watch cameras at both ends to
make sure that any car that goes in one end comes out the other and sends in agents if
a car takes too long, but this road allows individuals to visit one of the most guarded
countries on earth without a visa or even a passport. Despite the US’ affinity for large walls,
secure borders, and heavily armed agents, you can legally visit the US without passing
through border controls or immigration. As the longest international border in the
world, there are actually quite a few unguarded border crossings on the US-Canada border,
but when crossing one you are still required to self-report to the nearest border patrol
station, with one exception. Hyder, Alaska has the unique distinction of
being the only town in the southern half of Alaska’s panhandle to be connected to the
outside world by road. That is, though, because it in directly across
the border from Canada. Given that, the only roads into Hyder come
from Canada and you can’t drive anywhere in the United States from Hyder. There are therefore no US border controls
when passing into Hyder and there’s no requirement to self-report to a border patrol station. There is, however, a Canadian border control
station when passing back into Canada from Hyder meaning you could accidentally cross
into the US without a passport and get stuck. Hyder is essentially a Canadian town stuck
in Alaska. The residents unofficially use the timezone
of British Columbia rather than Alaska, use Canadian dollars, have Canadian phone numbers,
and use Canadian fire and ambulance services. Perhaps most interesting, however, is that
you need a passport to travel to the United States from Hyder. While it doesn't have an airport, it does
have a seaplane base with regularly scheduled commercial flights to Ketchikan, Alaska. Even though this flight is fully within the
same country and state, upon arrival in Ketchikan all passengers are sent through US customs. It makes sense—the reason Hyder doesn’t
have US customs in is because there’s no way to get out to the rest of the US—but
this flight is the only time that you need a passport to travel from one part of the
US to another. Now for the grandaddy of “which country
am I in,” questions. Which country are you in while in a plane. Let’s say you’re flying in an Irish registered
airplane from Paris over Canada to New York. Are you in Ireland, France, Canada, or the
United States? This gets super complicated. According to immigration law, you’re not
in any country, just like in an International Airport even though you are physically in
the sovereign territory of Canada. Each country sets its own upper limit to its
sovereignty above earth, but all countries have their limit above the altitude at which
planes fly. From a legal view, however, within that plane
you could be in Ireland, France, Canada, and the United States all at once. Jurisdiction for crimes committed in the air
gets really fuzzy. Depending on their own laws, each country
could prosecute the same crime. Most of the time the laws that apply are those
of the aircraft’s country of registration—Ireland in this case—but assuming the plane continued
to its final destination in the US, the arresting officers for a crime would be US police and
therefore, unless another country claimed jurisdiction, the trial would take plane in
the US under US law since the plane landed in the US. However, Canada could also claim jurisdiction. In 1988 Pan Am flight 103 was brought down
by terrorists over Lockerbie, Scotland. Of course jurisdiction was a huge issue especially
considering the suspects were Libyan, but in the end the trial was held in a Scottish
court under Scot law. Since it was overflying Scotland and therefore
in Scottish territory when the plane was brought down, they got jurisdiction, however, for
complicated diplomatic reasons relating the extradition of the suspects, the trial was
actually held in an old US Air Force Base in the Netherlands that was temporarily ceded
over to Scotland. The rather disappointing answer to which country
you’re in when flying is that it depends. Countries will just claim or ignore their
jurisdiction depending on convenience. In the end, the only way to find out might
just be to hop on a flight and commit a crime. This video was made possible by Hover. Hover is by far the easiest, best, and often
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Hey so in case you have any questions I made this so leave any questions below and I'll do my best to answer them!
Did he just blatantly encourage me to commit a crime on a plane at the end there?
Tom Scott has a great video that talks about the road that runs through Russia.
You missed an interesting one on the Canada / US border as well. In Waterton, AB (Canada) you can board a 15 minute ferry on the lake into the USA in order to visit Goat Haunt. You are dropped off in the USA, do the hike, and return to the ferry at the end of the day and take it back to Canada.
The reason they get away with this is because the drop-off point in the USA is in the middle of a national park and is miles and miles from any road or form of civilization.
Info
Til I've been pronouncing schiphol wrong. For 3 fucking years. I've been in that airport 12 times
This video is very nicely done but not correct at all.
When you are in a international airport you are in the host country it is located in. (For immigration and lawbreaking purposes as well). You allowed in on conditional status. The proof of this is that you can be removed from the country even after leaving the international airport. Customs is just giving permissions to remain in the country and they can revoke it as well. (If you are citizen of the country you arriving in you are automatically admitted and even if they hold you they are required by law to release unless you committed a crime)
When you use US Preclearance Facilities you are not in the US at all rather in the host country with permission to enter the US from US border agents. You are allowed to leave the Preclearance facility without having to go through border control of the host country (Although many countries have a reverse (exit control).
Edit: Although I am not a lawyer. I have travelled international extensivelly and have been in some of the scenarios (I.E. I had to leave a preclearance facility since I missed my flight and the next one was the next day. I couldn't remain there overnight.) (I was also in Guatemala where they accidentally let part of the flight of the domestic exit gates. The airline contacted us and told us we had to return the airport and go through customs.)
The US has a border zone buts that a whole different discussion. https://www.aclu.org/other/constitution-100-mile-border-zone
great video, ending note was kinda uncool tho
You don't have to worry about jurisdiction if you get beaten to death by the police when you arrive in America