How many billion $$$ on homeland security so far this century?
Apparently, it's not enough.
Officials probe Houston-bound flight's dynamite incident
Updated 8/26/2006 12:11 PM ET
HOUSTON (AP) — U.S. and Argentine authorities were investigating how a
stick of dynamite in a college student's checked luggage ended up on a
Houston-bound flight, one of seven security incidents that disrupted
U.S. flights in a day.
There was no indication terrorism was involved in any of the incidents,
which caused two flights to be diverted, others to be delayed and
passengers to be questioned.
The dynamite was discovered during a baggage search in an inspection
station at Bush Intercontinental Airport shortly after Continental
Airlines Flight 52 from Argentina landed early Friday.
Argentina's chief of airport security police, Marcelo Sain, said in a
televised interview Friday that authorities there were in contact with
U.S. officials as they opened their own probe into how the explosive got
into the baggage.
The student, 21-year-old Howard McFarland Fish, was charged with
carrying an explosive aboard an aircraft and was in the custody of U.S.
Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
Houston Fire Department Assistant Chief Omero Longoria said Fish told
authorities he works in mining and often handles explosives.
Fish's father, Howard, said he is certain his son, who bought the
dynamite while visiting a silver mine while traveling in South America,
intended no harm.
"It's a 21-year-old kid not paying careful attention to the press and
thinking it would be cool to have a piece of dynamite," Howard Fish, of
Old Lyme, Conn., said Friday night.
The younger Fish attends Lafayette College in Easton, Pa.
The U.S. Attorney's Office in Houston said he would appear before a
federal magistrate Monday. Carrying an explosive aboard an aircraft
carries a maximum penalty of 10 years in prison and a fine of up to
$250,000.
The incident could have been disastrous and raises questions about
security in overseas airports, said Bill Waldock, aviation safety
professor at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University in Arizona, adding
that dynamite can be unstable if it's old.
"You're in a pressurized airplane, you get a detonation in the cargo
hold, it could blow a hole in the airplane big enough to bring it down,"
he said.
In other incidents:
•An American Airlines flight from England to Chicago was forced to land
in Bangor, Maine, after federal officials "learned of a reported
threat," FBI spokeswoman Gail Marcinkiewicz said. Marcinkiewicz said no
one was arrested but declined to say if anyone from the flight out of
Manchester was in custody.
•A US Airways jet was diverted to Oklahoma City's Will Rogers World
Airport after a federal air marshal subdued a disruptive passenger who
had pushed a flight attendant, the FBI said.
The passenger was undergoing a mental evaluation, and authorities had
yet to determine what criminal charges he might face. The twin-engine
jet returned to flight three hours later on its trip from Phoenix to
Charlotte
•A Continental Airlines flight from Corpus Christi, Texas, to
Bakersfield, Calif., was held in El Paso, one of its scheduled stops,
after the crew discovered a missing panel in the lavatory, authorities said.
•A utility knife was found on a vacant passenger seat of a US Airways
flight that had traveled from Philadelphia to Bradley International
Airport in Connecticut, state police said. No arrests were made and
there were no threats involved, said Master Sgt. J. Paul Vance, state
police spokesman.
•An Aer Lingus flight from New York to Dublin was evacuated Friday
morning during a scheduled stopover in western Ireland following a bomb
threat that turned out to be unfounded, officials said.
•A United Airlines flight out of Chicago's O'Hare International Airport
was delayed because a small boy said something inappropriate, according
to a government official speaking on condition of anonymity because of
the sensitivity of the information. "He didn't want to fly," the
official said.
The Manchester-to-Chicago flight, American Airlines Flight 55, was
diverted to Bangor for security reasons, Federal Aviation Administration
spokeswoman Arlene Murray said.
Find this article at:
http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2006-08-26-dynamite-traces_x.htm?csp=34
