Pennsylvania Surplus Store Lets You Buy Back That Shake Weight The TSA Confiscated

You’ve just gone through airport security and you’re feeling bereft, after the Transportation Security Administration confiscated your pocket knife/Shake Weight (yes, really)/Play-Doh or anything that could be used as a weapon. It doesn’t just get dumped in a lost and found bin to collect dust or straight into the pockets of TSA agents, so where does it go?

The answer is: A state surplus store. Well, at least one such store in Pennsylvania gets a lot of confiscated goodies from the TSA, reports CNNMoney.

“We get a lot of scissors, a lot of cork screws, a lot of nail files,” says the man running the store. All of that and more comes in, jumbled together in huge boxes with no rhyme or reason. He adds of their varied stock, “We don’t determine what gets confiscated or voluntarily surrendered.”

The store then sifts through all the confiscated goods and sorts them out for sale, from the actual weapons like knives to the other things that could be used as weapons, like golf clubs or children’s toys. Play Doh? Two words, he says — “Plastic explosives.”

You can even shop around on the store’s site, govdeals.com, and order up anything from Asphalt Equipment to  Vans. Although we’re sure not all of that went through the TSA.

So if you’re missing your bowling ball or your favorite pair of scissors, at least now you know where you could possibly reunite with it. Just head to Harrisburg, Pa. and prepare to dig. And if you can’t find what you need there, you can always visit the Unclaimed Baggage Center in Scottsboro, Ala.


TSA nab your knife? Buy it back [CNNMoney]

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