Evacuation at LAX Blamed on Equipment

A mechanical defect in one of the luggage scanners at a security checkpoint in one of the busiest terminals at Los Angeles International Airport was responsible for the evacuation of the facility Saturday afternoon, a security official said Monday.

The 90-minute evacuation and re-screening of hundreds of passengers and visitors in Terminal 1 was ordered after an attendant employed by the Whitewood Security Services firm saw what she thought was the outline of a gun in a woman’s handbag.

Normally, the attendant would simply have pushed a button and halted the suspicious handbag inside the scanner so a supervisor could take a better look, said Bill Wysong, vice president of operations and marketing for Whitewood.

But in this case, Wysong said, a technical problem allowed “the particular bag to come halfway out� of the machine, and before the supervisor arrived, the owner of the bag simply walked off with it.

“[Our personnel] thought the bag was still in the X-ray machine,� Wysong said. “The supervisor turned the machine on and nothing came out.�

The result was that the entire terminal had to be vacated, every airplane in the terminal inspected, and everyone re-screened. When this was done, it was discovered that one woman had what appeared to be a gun but was actually a cigarette lighter that looked like a .25-caliber pistol.

“We catch these all the time,� Wysong said Monday. “It’s not an unusual thing at all.� The woman who owned the lighter was released.

Wysong said the defect was identified when the machine was tested later that night and Sunday. A minor adjustment to correct the operation of the scanner was being performed Monday.

The security firm official said the attendant has been suspended, pending completion of an inquiry into the incident, “but if she’s found not to be responsible in any way, she certainly will be reinstated with pay.�

Wysong said that Whitewood began handling the checkpoint operations at Terminal 1 last September and has also done some work at Burbank Airport. The attendant, who was not identified, has worked for the firm about 20 days and received required computer training and 40 hours of on-the-job training, he said.

Southwest Airlines, one of three carriers at Terminal 1, hired Whitewood. A Southwest spokesman, Ed Stewart, said Monday that the incident shows “the system does work.�

There was some inconvenience, “but from the standpoint of the airline business, you have three key factors--safety, safety and safety,� Stewart said.