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Related to this question, apparently someone who is on a USA no-fly list will not be allowed on international flights between other countries, if they have a chance of overflying or diverting to the US. And it's understandable that airlines would check this as part of the immigration prescreening, since they have to do that anyway.

So several people suggested he fly from Europe to Canadian airports nowhere near the US, such as Gander, Halifax or St. John's. That's great, but if you flew internationally into St. John's, the only sane way to travel onward is flight.

They don't do immigration prescreening on domestic flights. So would he still get flagged/blocked if he attempted a St. John's-Toronto or Halifax-Vancouver domestic flight?

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  • 2
    The Toronto - Vancouver train takes four days.
    – user4188
    Commented Mar 5, 2019 at 17:01
  • 3
    In theory domestic Mexican flights could also be affected.
    – JonathanReez ♦
    Commented Mar 5, 2019 at 17:04
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    @DJClayworth The train from Halifax to Montreal takes about 24hrs. This is comparable to the driving distance but of course without the need to operate a motor vehicle the whole time :)
    – Harper - Reinstate Monica
    Commented Mar 5, 2019 at 20:15
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    Note that a lot of Canadian domestic flights routinely overfly the U.S., most notably flights to/from Victoria, BC and flights into or out of the southern Ontario airports (Windsor, London, Hamilton, Toronto Pearson, Toronto Billy Bishop). My flights from Regina to Toronto have flown as far south as over Green Bay, Wisconsin.
    – Jim MacKenzie
    Commented Mar 7, 2019 at 14:57
  • 1
    @chx And is something like C$3,000
    – Azor Ahai -him-
    Commented Mar 7, 2019 at 21:39

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The answer is no, they would not be prevented from boarding a domestic flight. Canada's compliance with the TSA no-fly list started in 2011 with the passage of Bill C-42:

Despite section 5 of the Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act, to the extent that that section relates to obligations set out in Schedule 1 to that Act relating to the disclosure of information, and despite subsection 7(3) of that Act, an operator of an aircraft departing from Canada that is due to land in a foreign state or fly over the United States and land outside Canada or of a Canadian aircraft departing from any place outside Canada that is due to land in a foreign state or fly over the United States may, in accordance with the regulations, provide to a competent authority in that foreign state any information that is in the operator’s control relating to persons on board or expected to be on board the aircraft and that is required by the laws of the foreign state.

As we can see, only flights that depart or land outside of Canada are permitted to transmit APIS data to foreign officials and thus domestic flights are exempted. This interpretation is confirmed in the legislative summary published by the Library of Parliament.

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  • Thank you for the answer and for running the bounty! Also I think people in both Oxford and Chicago would agree, Canadian lawmakers could stand to use more commas :)
    – Harper - Reinstate Monica
    Commented Apr 20, 2019 at 6:00

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