Posted on 12/02/2011 11:14:58 AM PST by rawhide
JACKSONVILLE, Fla. - A teenage girl's sense of style got her in trouble at the airport.
Vanessa Gibbs, 17, claims the Transportation Security Administration stopped her at the security gate because of the design of a gun on her handbag.
Gibbs said she had no problem going through security at Jacksonville International Airport, but rather, when she headed home from Virginia.
"It's my style, it's camouflage, it has an old western gun on it," Gibbs said.
But her preference for the pistol style didn't sit well with TSA agents at the Norfolk airport.
Gibbs said she was headed back home to Jacksonville from a holiday trip when an agent flagged her purse as a security risk.
"She was like, 'This is a federal offense because it's in the shape of a gun,'" Gibbs said. "I'm like, 'But it's a design on a purse. How is it a federal offense?'"
After agents figured out the gun was a fake, Gibbs said, TSA told her to check the bag or turn it over.
By the time security wrapped up the inspection, the pregnant teen missed her flight, and Southwest Airlines sent her to Orlando instead, worrying her mother, who was already waiting for her to arrive at JIA.
"Oh, it's terrifying. I was so upset," said Tami Gibbs, the teen's mom. "I was on the phone all the way to Orlando trying to figure out what was going on with her. It was terrifying. I don't ever want to go through it again."
Vanessa and her mom said it's hard to believe anyone could mistake the design on the purse for a real gun because it's just a few inches in size and it's hollow, not to mention Vanessa has taken it on planes before.
"I carried this from Jacksonville to Norfolk, and I've carried it from Norfolk to Jacksonville," Vanessa said. "Never once has anyone said anything about it until now."
TSA isn't budging on the handbag, arguing the phony gun could be considered a "replica weapon." The TSA says "replica weapons have prohibited since 2002."
It's a rule that Vanessa feels can't be applied to a purse.
"Common sense," she said. "It's a purse, not a weapon."
A TSA official at JIA said it's not that uncommon for passengers to wear something that could be considered a gun replica, but the official encourages everyone to check the prohibited items list, which can be found online or at the airport before going through security.
If only they weren't monotoring domestic communications, or at least have a way to assure us that they are deleting everything that has nothing to do with actual terrorism (by OUR definition).
Or whisper "gun".
Or draw a picture of a gun.
Or carry a sandwich that might look like a bomb.
Or anything that "offends" liberals.
Not to mention water boarded to find out where she bought that evil instrument of mass destruction.
From there they can pass the lead to Janet Incompetano's DHS so they can find out where the illicit manufacturing plant is. Probably Mexico. May be part of their Purse Walker program.
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Watch out, pandy! Your entire wardrobe may be probable cause to send you to Gitmo without a trial.
They would all be reassigned constantly. It would be a continual flux of personnel.
“monotoring domestic communications”
How are they supposed to track the terrorists here, who are getting updates from abroad?
Your paranoia is misplaced!
It is a power trip for the TSA. We will comply because they said so and nothing is too asinine. This is simple conditioning. We will obey and that’s that. Their commands may be arbitrary, without rule, and senseless in nature. It does not matter because they are the TSA and we will obey.
Our side needs a group similar to the ACLU in their aggresiveness.
God knows the NRA isn’t doing much for the cause.
“gold only became a metal post 9/11? who knew?”
According to the jeweler, the metal detectors (at least then) worked on magnetism. If it wasn’t a ferrous metal, they didn’t detect it. I have no idea whether they’d detect gold now. The point is that when the derringer was in the belt buckle it looked like a two dimensional decoration, similar to the gun on the purse. This guy had plenty of dunlop, so I don’t imagine anybody got a good look at it either.
Exactly why people need to travel with their guns!
I hope to travel cross country (on a plane) with my gun and take a course in CQC. More gun owners need to do the same.....even if it just means carrying in a state with reciprocity.
Make travel with a gun commonplace and this nonsense will go away.
"Looks like", but dimensionally it's only half the size, so there's no ammuntion manufactured that it could fire, and she's never going to get those fat fingers of hers through the trigger guard anyway
There's the problem. We're $14T in debt, and paying these people with money borrowed from our grandchildren. With accumulated interest it'll probably take 2 man-hours of work from the private sector to pay for every hour of salary and benefits for the people, and this is what we're getting for it.
I know what you're saying about inviting trouble and I know your posting well enough to know that you're no pushover at all but how far do you want to bend to their political correctness and bureaucratic blindness just to avoid a hassle?
I guess I won't fly at all because of this kind of nonsense but then I wouldn't fly much even if it was easy. We've got to push back against it some way though.
After agents figured out the gun was a fake,
FINALLY!!!
Before there was a TSA, airline security was handled by private contractors. They were accused (with justice) of hiring minimum-wage, bottom-of-the-barrel scrapings, to save money. Then airline security was nationalized. We had to get rid of those minimum-wage idiots and hire higher-quality civil servants. So, when TSA started advertising for employees, they required a certain minimum of experience (one year, as I recall) with airline security. Well, who had that experience? The bottom-of-the-barrel scrapings who had been working for the private contractors. Now those minimum-wage workers were civil servants. Better pay, can't be fired, etc., etc. And where are those people now? Most have been promoted into TSA management, and have hired people like themselves to deal with the public.
That is NOT a replica!
A replica is a true and faithful reproduction. In other words, a replica machine gun is REALLY a machine gun! YOU STUPID FEDERAL DUMBASSES!
"Security" schmecurity. These bungholes can start talking about security when the border is closed.
All else is mere theater of the absurd.
No it isn't, it is a copy of a modern Colt or S&W revolver.
Perhaps, but my own paranoia stems from hearing "Big Sis" naming us as the real threat, not the actual terrorists.
People such as you and I are the enemy of this administration.
she and obama are a different story......
they are a threat to America!
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