Over the years, a number of people have been stopped at airport security checkpoints for carrying weapons — guns, knives, box cutters, the occasional M-622 Avalanche — that the passenger claimed they had accidentally stowed in their carry-on bag. But who is responsible once that traveler gets through the checkpoint? [More]
airport security
Arrested Traveler Says She Shouldn't Be Held Responsible Because TSA Didn't Spot Her Handgun
By 1.20.12
Airline Passengers Emptied Their Pockets & Left $400K Worth Of Change Behind In 2010
By 1.12.12
Airport security areas are basically just one big change jar, as the Transportation Security Administration reports that passengers left behind around $400,000 in coins in 2010. Which means either we’re forgetting our nickels and dimes or consciously choosing to ditch those pennies instead of filling our pockets back up. [More]
TSA Agent Finds Pot In Rapper's Bag, Leaves Note Rather Than Confiscating It
By 12.16.11
Remember that TSA agent who left a “get your freak on” note inside the bag of a woman who packed a vibrator — and was subsequently fired for doing so? Well it looks like that agent was not the only wannabe quipster among his security-screening kin. [More]
Lawmakers Ask TSA To Place Passenger Advocates In Airports
By 12.12.11
Considering all the negative press the Transportation Security Administration has received in recent years over its invasive airport security screening procedures, it couldn’t hurt for the TSA to have staffers on hand whose job it is to consider the best interest of the passengers. [More]
TSA Thinks Fake Gun On Your Handbag Is A Security Threat
By 12.2.11
While gun replicas have been outlawed on planes since 2002, should that include miniature designs of pistols that are part of your handbag? This is the question that vexed a teenager who was stopped by TSA agents and told that her weaponized handbag was some sort of illegal security risk. [More]
Are Airport X-Ray Machines Killing Kindles?
By 11.21.11
The Amazon Kindle and other similar e-readers can be quite convenient for frequent air travelers who want to fly without packing heavy or bulky books. But some European jet-setters are reporting that run-ins with airport X-ray machines are killing their Kindles. [More]
Anti-TSA Complaints At All-Time Low
By 11.18.11
Even as there has been growing concern about full-body scanners and grope-y pat downs at airport security checkpoints, the actual number of complaints against the Transportation Security Administration hit an all-time low last month. [More]
Some Full-Body Airport Scanners Banned In Europe
By 11.15.11
The full-body scanners being rolled out at security checkpoints in U.S. airports are either of the millimeter-wave type, which uses radio frequency waves, or the backscatter X-ray type, which uses ionizing radiation — and which has effectively been banned from use in European airports. [More]
TSA Warns Passengers: Wrapped Gifts May Need To Be Unwrapped
By 11.14.11
If you have to fly this holiday season and you were planning on wrapping any presents before you get on the plane, the folks at the TSA have issued their annual word of caution on the matter: They may need to unwrap those carefully packed gifts. [More]
The TSA Thinks You Might Be Hiding Weapons In Your Big Hair
By 9.21.11
Here’s a warning to the big-haired travelers of the world: Your voluminous ‘do might merit a second round of security screening the next time you’re traveling through the airport. [More]
TSA Agents Accused Of Being Bribed With Gift Cards To Help Drug Dealers
By 9.14.11
The feds recently arrested 18 individuals accused of being involved in a mult-state drug trafficking ring. But along with the baker’s dozen of alleged drug dealers caught up in the scheme were five folks — three TSA officers and two cops — who are usually supposed to stop this sort of behavior. [More]
Passenger: United Cabin Crew Thinks Books About Old Airplanes Signify A Security Threat
By 8.24.11
Last week, folk singer and aviation enthusiast Vance Gilbert thought he’d pass the time on his United Airlines flight from Boston to Washington, DC, by perusing some books about old aircraft. This was apparently enough to set off alarm bells among the flight crew, who had the plane return to the gate where Gilbert was met by the authorities. [More]
Pregnant Passenger Says TSA Confiscated Her Insulin
By 8.8.11
The ever-vigilant Transportation Security Administration has kept the air safe from harmless fluids by confiscating a pregnant traveler’s insulin and ice packs as she tried to board a flight from Denver to Phoenix last week. [More]
TSA Begins Installing Software That Makes Scanners Less R-Rated
By 7.20.11
For travelers whose main concern about the TSA’s full-body scanners is the potential of having their naked form displayed or downloaded onto some screener’s thumb drive, this may be good news. The agency announced today that it has begun installing software that displays objects hidden beneath passengers’ clothes but not show detailed images of their nude bodies. [More]
Woman Gets Knife Past TSA Checkpoints Not Once, But Twice!
By 7.19.11
What with reports indicating a plethora of security breaches at U.S. airports, why not check out some of those statistics in action? Two such breaches may have occurred recently, as an Indianapolis woman claims she made it through security twice with a knife in her carry-on. [More]
Reader: TSA Agent Cracks Timothy McVeigh Joke That Would Probably Have Gotten Me Detained
By 7.18.11
For all the wise-cracking most of us do about the TSA and airport security procedures, we also know that when it comes time to actually pass through the checkpoint on our way to the gate, it’s probably not the best time to be a jokester. But, says a Consumerist reader, there is at least one TSA screener who thinks it’s perfectly fine for him to lightheartedly reference Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh. [More]
Appeals Court: Feds Rushed To Roll Out Controversial TSA Scanners
By 7.15.11
An appeals court panel in Washington, D.C., ruled today that the government jumped the gun by not seeking public feedback before rolling out airport scanners that see through travelers’ clothes. Unfortunately for those opposed to these devices, the scanners are not going anywhere. [More]
