air travel with frozen breast milk?

Hi,
I'll be traveling to Austin, Texas in April where a number of amazing donors have already provided milk for me and my adopted daughter. The problem is, after our wedding in Austin, we're going to be traveling to Scottsdale, Arizona by air and I want to take as much of the frozen milk that's in Austin as possible (since I couldn't find a local donor in Scottsdale), so my question, has anyone traveled by air and taken frozen milk with them? And how did you do it? Did the airport security give you any trouble?

Thanks so much,
Manjit

I flew probably four different times with an ice chest full of milk. We even flew international with it and never had any trouble. I just packed it well in a big ice chest, taped it shut, and checked it in with the rest of my luggage. They gave us no trouble whatsoever. I don't think you should have any problems. Hope it goes well for you!

Kathleen

I've flown twice with breastmilk too. I actually used dry ice just because I was nervous about the time getting to the airport, flying and getting to the hotel and finding a freezer, so I didn't want to have to worry about the milk for 24 hours. I had no problems either - but I always brought the milk as carry on - I did have some odd looks in security though

Thanks ladies,
A few questions:Kathy, did you fill the ice chest with regular ice and if so, did the frozen milk stay frozen through out the flight? How much did you pack? By ice chest do you mean a cooler?

Jburth: where did you find the dry ice, how much did you transport and what kind of container did you use? I feel better about taking it as carry on, just because I'm scared that the airline company may lose it and i can't have that happen!
Thanks ladies for the help! And if anyone else has stories, please fee free to include them!
manjit

Hi Manjit,

I have flown once with frozen milk as check-in luggage, too

I bought a cooler (Coleman brand, 50 quarts, with rolling wheels and expandable carrying handle like a suitecase), and packed the cooler with milk bags. I didn't have any more extra space in the cooler for frozen jel pack etc.; the cooler was literally packed. The total time the milk was in the cooler was about 17 hours, and all of them stayed very well frozen. The very top layer of the bags in the cooler, and only the outside edges of the bags started to thaw just a little (but still frozen, not even slushy or anything). So, as long as your flight isn't too long, it should be fine, I think.

I also bought a luggage belt (?) at Walmart to secure the cooler tight. (something like this: http://www.buy.com/prod/belle-hop-neon-luggage-belt-set-of-2/q/loc/16234/204727965.html) It was only $5-ish at Wamart.

When I checked in the luggage, they did ask what was in it and if there is any ice (maybe they meant dry ice). I said it's frozen breast milk, and said no ice (or dry ice). I just paid the check-in luggage fee of $25, and that was it. No weird look or further questions :-)

Oh, I wouldn't put regular ice inside the cooler. According to this article (http://www.mothering.com/breastfeeding/traveling-breastmilk), regular ice is not recommended. Frozen Jel pack should be used instead.

As for carrying breast milk as carry-on, I would check the TSA website (http://www.tsa.gov/travelers/airtravel/children/formula.shtm). From my experience, I traveled by myself (w/o my baby), and honestly, no one questioned me at the security check point. I put my electronic pump bag and cooler (I had a small cloth-type cooler bag along with my pump bag) through the security machine fine, and I forgot to declare that I had breast milk, but no one asked me any questions.

My personal suggestion as other ladies have also mentioned is to get a cooler big enough to hold the milk bags, put frozen jel packs, and take it as either check-in or carry-on. But I think you can only have one more carry-on besides your purse etc., and they have size limitation, too, so I'm not sure which is better (check-in or carry-on), depending on the amount of milk.

Sorry for my lengthy post, but I hope it helps!

p.s. I hope you got enough milk for the whole duration of the trip. If you need more when you are at Scottsdale, let me know. I am going to Austin again at the end of this month.

I used frozen jel packs and then put a layer of towels in on top of the milk bags to take up the extra space. If I remember right the milk was still frozen except for the top bags were beginning to thaw just a little around the edges. I flew to Costa Rica like this twice so the time out of the freezer was quite long...I liked to put my cooler into my big chest freezer the night before we flew so everything was as cold as possible. I think only once did I use a big Coleman cooler...the other times it was an insulated cooler that was probably the size of a huge diaper bag???

Thanks so much ladies, I really appreciate the help. My flight is less than 3 hours so a cooler with gel pack should be fine. I think I may check it in because I'll have about 200 oz.
Thanks,
Manjit

You've gotten great advice, I'll add more info from my experience.

I too didn't want to chance having the airline lose the milk as I needed it to supplement during my trip.

I used a soft sided cooler. I packed the cooler with dry ice on the bottom, milk, then dry ice on the top. I filled in any "spaces" in the cooler with newspaper as that is supposed to help make the dry ice last longer. I got the dry ice from a gas station by my house, but I remember when I looked online that there were several places in the area that carried dry ice. I would just do a google search for dry ice. The limit for dry ice is 4.4 lbs. I used just under 4 lbs in my bag which was MORE than enough to keep my milk cool for up to 24 hours. I labeled the outside of the container with "HUMAN MILK" and how much dry ice was in the container.

When I went through security, I had to declare that I had a liquid item. The TSA official opened the cooler and looked through it. I had to change planes twice during my trip and one of the legs of the trip I got questioned and the agent said I wasn't allowed to carry milk on the plane. I just told her that I had read the TSA site and I was. She asked her superviser who agreed with me and off I went.

As for having your baby or not - it DOES NOT MATTER! The TSA website says that a mother can carry a "reasonable" amount of breastmilk with her for the duration of her trip. It does not matter if your baby is with you or not. I would recommend reading this website: http://www.tsa.gov/travelers/airtravel/children/formula.shtm

This website explains everything that I read about my travels and it was good for me to know the info since I did get "stopped" at one leg of my trip and knowing this info saved me a lot of time and trouble.

You should not have any problems doing carry-on. I liked the dry ice because I didn't have to worry about the ice and having the milk come unthawed even a little bit. I'm pretty paranoid about my milk being even a little frosty as it is supposed to stay rock solid cold until use and I didn't want to toss any of the liquid gold that others had provided to me. My milk was solid when I reached my destination where I put it into another freezer.

Good luck!
Jodi

When you check your luggage, they ask you (or rather they should) if you have any dry ice, because if it's stowed next to someone's pet it could kill it as it vents (it's frozen carbon dioxide).

So if you have a cooler with dry ice in it, even if they don't ask, please tell them so they can put it on the other side of the plane.