[Elecraft] Re: KX1 and airport security

[al_lorona at agilent.com]

> He got REALLY excited and began pointing at it, yelling,
> "WHUT ISS DAT?", over and over as he backed away 
> from the car.  My 14 year-old son got out of the car to 
> see what he was upset over and when he tried to pick 
> it up and show the guard it was only a radio, the guard 
> got even MORE excited, screaming "NO!!! LEAVE IT
> 'LONE!!!".  About 5 minutes later, after finally getting 
> him calmed down, he finally, and hurriedly, motioned us 
> on through the checkpoint. Thank goodness he didn't 
> have a firearm with him.  He probably would have
> drawn it from it's holster.

Rick, this is such an amazing and incredible story. I think maybe the guard has seen too many James Bond films, no?

But this thread also points out that many, many people have stories like this. I won't even go into the time that I took my little QRP rig through LAX (years before 9/11), was held up going through X-ray, had my briefcase and shaving kit dumped out on the table, with a guard hunched over staring at my rig for several minutes and then finally shrugging pathetically and saying, "Voices come out of this thing?"

Nor will I recount, as I sat waiting at the gate afterward still burning over the incident that spilled my toothpaste-pills-allligator clips all over the floor, the over three minutes that it took someone to show up when a security door leading to the tarmac was opened and left opened as the ear-splitting alarm rang, without ceasing, for all of those three or four minutes. Plenty of time for someone to run out to the aircraft and plant a bomb and run back. They sure took their time responding to that. 

But a QRP rig?? Now THAT'S dangerous enough to detain someone over!!


Al  W6LX