: do not give in to evil but proceed ever more boldly against it :

Airline Insecurity

Monday morning in the Minneapolis Airport, while standing in line to check my bags, something unusual happened. It was 6:30AM and the airport was already packed and bustling. Lines were long. People were grumpy.

I glanced to my left and noticed a couple of feet away from me a garment bag laying in the middle of the floor unattended. I asked everyone in line if it belonged to them. Nobody claimed it. Some of the people in line started to get nervous. We sat there staring at it like it was a dead body or something. Some of the people in line even started moving away from it out of line.

I flagged down an airline rep and pointed it out to him. He left for a moment and returned with his supervisor. I don’t know if they were airport security. They had badges on, but everyone down there who drives a golf cart also has a badge on, so who knows.

The two men walk over to the bag together. The supervisor stops about 10 feet from it, cautious. The rep doesn’t notice him stopping, and continues right up to the bag and picked it up. The stunned supervisor yells, “Put it down, put it down!” The rep quicky drops it right in the spot where it was and hops away.

The two of them beat it out of there together with the rep saying “It felt empty to me,” and left the rest of us standing there shocked and puzzled, wondering just how they would have identified our remains had their been a bomb in the bag.

I checked my bag, walked to the back of the line. The bag still there and no airline security or reps were in sight. I thought about asking someone else for help, but I was running late for a flight.

So I walked over to a long line where I had to go stand 20 minutes, show my ID and boarding pass, take off my shoes and belt, and have a wand passed over me, all because I just might be a threat to my fellow passengers’ safety . . .

July 23, 2005 | Filed Under Misc 

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