The Gun Curse Continues...
You recall how I was grumbling the other day about the hassles I and a group of friends had experienced in our efforts to import a bunch of historical firearms from the US? Well, fresh new difficulties continue to pile on top of the old ones.
As of the last update, the errant firearms had been sent from Melbourne Customs (where the should not have been sent) to Adelaide Customs (where they should have been sent), and there seemed to be some problems with some of them failing a mysterious "safety test". I wound up the post saying Oh, and just to keep things interesting, it seems that the letter from Adelaide Customs that states all this only mentions six of the nine firearms in the shipment. Have they lost three, or did they just get left off the letter by mistake in all the rush? I guess we'll find out next week.
Well, I've found out. I just got a phone call from an extremely irate Artyem, who advised me that apparently Adelaide Customs only received six of the nine guns we had sent from the US. And which three were missing? The three carbines, one of which is my gun, and the only one that I had in this batch. Joy.
So where are the three missing guns? Nobody knows at this point. I'm willing to bet that they're still in Melbourne, stuck somewhere in some mislabelled box in a storage facility. But that's just a guess. Still, the nice thing about firearms is that they leave a pretty comprehensive papertrail behind them, so it should be possible to backtrack along that trail and work out what happened... did they get lost in transit across the Pacific, or mislaid by Melbourne Customs, or lost somewhere between Melbourne and Adelaide?
We will find out. And if they are genuinely missing, I'm sure the Police will be very interested in helping us track them down. But we're going to take things step by step. Tomorrow we're going to visit Adelaide Customs, and we'll also contact the US exporter and get them to fax us copies of the paperwork confirming shipping. After that... we shall see. It's probably just a bureaucratic fuckup somewhere. But if it isn't... there'll be hell to pay. I'll be making sure of that.
As of the last update, the errant firearms had been sent from Melbourne Customs (where the should not have been sent) to Adelaide Customs (where they should have been sent), and there seemed to be some problems with some of them failing a mysterious "safety test". I wound up the post saying Oh, and just to keep things interesting, it seems that the letter from Adelaide Customs that states all this only mentions six of the nine firearms in the shipment. Have they lost three, or did they just get left off the letter by mistake in all the rush? I guess we'll find out next week.
Well, I've found out. I just got a phone call from an extremely irate Artyem, who advised me that apparently Adelaide Customs only received six of the nine guns we had sent from the US. And which three were missing? The three carbines, one of which is my gun, and the only one that I had in this batch. Joy.
So where are the three missing guns? Nobody knows at this point. I'm willing to bet that they're still in Melbourne, stuck somewhere in some mislabelled box in a storage facility. But that's just a guess. Still, the nice thing about firearms is that they leave a pretty comprehensive papertrail behind them, so it should be possible to backtrack along that trail and work out what happened... did they get lost in transit across the Pacific, or mislaid by Melbourne Customs, or lost somewhere between Melbourne and Adelaide?
We will find out. And if they are genuinely missing, I'm sure the Police will be very interested in helping us track them down. But we're going to take things step by step. Tomorrow we're going to visit Adelaide Customs, and we'll also contact the US exporter and get them to fax us copies of the paperwork confirming shipping. After that... we shall see. It's probably just a bureaucratic fuckup somewhere. But if it isn't... there'll be hell to pay. I'll be making sure of that.