On April 28, 1988, an Aloha Airlines 737's fuselage blew open at 24,000 feet, killing a flight attendant and injuring eight people.
Posted on 05/20/2005 4:43:45 PM PDT by wjersey
Two people were arrested Thursday night for allegedly trying to board a plane with guns at Philadelphia International Airport.
NBC 10 News has learned, and the FBI has confirmed that the men were just one step away from boarding an American Airlines flight sometime after 8 p.m. Thursday.
Sources told NBC 10 News that Timothy Robinson, of Philadelphia, and Steven Lundy, of Roselle, N.J., cleared the first checkpoint and were headed toward the airplane when an American Airlines representative looked at their paperwork and saw that the men were posing as police officers. The representative felt uncomfortable because she didn't think that they were really police officers, so she called the police department.
FBI agents said that the two men showed airport officials fake badges and fake police identification cards to clear security with the loaded handguns. They also filled out paperwork claiming that they were private police. Authorities said one gun was a .357 Magnum and the second gun was a 9 mm.
The Transportation and Safety Administration launched an investigation and the FBI arrested both men.
Robinson and Lundy were taken to the federal building in downtown Philadelphia Friday and were arraigned on charges connected to posing as polce officers and attempting to board an airplane with firearms.
The investigation is continuing.
TSA couldn't catch it, so it was down to a curious airline employee. Great.
Ladies and Gentlemen, your Department of Homeland Security!
"El Al has gurda armed with Uzis in the terminal and on its airliners to prevent hijackings and murders....
We have the TSA to annoy people!" P.J. O'Rourke.
Jack.
I realize this comes as a surprise to many people, but the movie Moonraker was not a documentary.
PING!
2 Armed Men Arrested at Airport
May 20, 2005 — The FBI says two men falsely identifying themselves as law enforcement officers tried to bring loaded handguns aboard a flight at Philadelphia International Airport but were caught before making their way onto the plane.
Authorities say 47-year-old Timothy Robinson of Philadelphia and 41-year-old Steven Lundy of Roselle, New Jersey, presented credentials to an American Airlines ticket agent yesterday. The F-B-I says they were falsely identifying themselves as "private police" who were traveling armed.
Authorities say the men got through a Transportation Security Administration checkpoint, but were stopped at the gate after someone got suspicious and phoned city police. They were held overnight and released this afternoon.
If they were, do you think the media would release the truth? NSNR
"Except when one went off and through a bulkhead."
Don't get your engineering data from the movies. You could fire off a couple of magazines of 7.62x49 inside an airliner and do no more than poke that many .30 cal holes. Very bad luck could damage some hydraulics.
No one would be sucked out a window nor would the airframe fail.
You'll never see them again.
Before everybody jumps on the TSA screener, this wasn't a screener missing something on the X-ray machine. Are the screeners taught to recognize fake documents and badges? I don't know the answer to that, but I'm betting no.
As a side question, how many of us would recognize fake credentials?
That was clever........
Dim Undergrounders. ;')
They had fake police creds, what else was fake? Maybe the names?
Oh, please, the cabin air outflow valve is bigger than a bullet hole. On the KC-10 (Same as DC-10 and similar to MD-11 airliners) the valve is about the size of a human head, you can watch the ground go by below through the valve, when its open a significant amount. This from a former KC-10 crew chief who had the office next to mine. The valve would just close down a little to compensate for the air loss through the bullet hole or holes.
Actually it would blow. The system regulates pressure by controlling the outflow through a valve, if the pressure drops, the valve closes some, if the pressure goes up, it opens somewhat. The bullet holes would start to cause a drop in pressure, due the air blowing out of them, the valve would then close down to reduce it's area by the area of the bullet holes. That's somewhat simplified, because outflow rates depend somewhat on the location of the holes.
But the aircraft did not break up. (Amazingly with that much of it gone, both structure and "skin") This one did depressurize, probably very quickly.
yes it did...and still flew & landed. That's the point.
I can't believe a bullet hole could do more damage and the plane not be able to be flown.
Words fail me.
Nevermind...
But don't bring a lighter on the plane!
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