I live in Reno, Nevada... a simple "small" town...(biggest little city in the world) and was feeling fairly confident that our world would not be significantly disrupted over the coming weeks... I was wrong...

At 6:00 PM tonight (12/23) while watching the local news, the newscaster came on with a "breaking story" about our small and "insignificant" airport being evacuated...

Thinking, "oh great... I've got relatives flying out tonight"... I was intent on listening...

Turns out (after waiting another half hour to wait for the story to develop) that a man claiming to be a police officer rushed ("pushed") through the security gates. The man was not detained and apparantly disapeared down the concourse before being questioned (or detained) by airport security ... The news said that FAA regulations calls for a gate evacuation in the event of such an event... this was done-- but as of this hour (9:30PM) the last report I've heard was that the man had not been found and could still be "hiding".... but that passengers had been allowed back into the concourse.

I'll know more at 11:00PM regarding the mysterious disapearing airport guy... I'll post more then...

Also, yesterday there was a fleeting local news report that "information regarding the stolen exlplosive material" from a local county agency would be helpful to police in the area... I've heard nothing about that story since last evening.

Noswad

-- Noswad (noswad@endeavor-net.com), December 24, 1999

Answers

Thanks Noswad. Looks like funky stuff is spreading, unfortunately, huh? So did your family make their flight out ok then?

-- Hokie (nn@va.com), December 24, 1999.

Okay... the 11:00PM news had the same story as its "big story" for the evening... except it turned out to be a big "non-story"...

Even though the mysterious man brandishing the police badge was never found-- the airport is currently "safe and secure"...

This is ridiculous! The entire story is all about the "missing man" who eluded airport security (who then evacutated the entire B terminal) and was not found!!!! yet, despite this the airport is now "safe and secure"????

My assesment (my positive assesment) is that someone totally screwed up and so as not to get the FAA pounding heads at our podunk airport, they sprayed airfreshener over a pile of smelly "bad dog"!

there is a much more to this than being reported...

Noswad...

-- Noswad (noswad@endeavor-net.com), December 24, 1999.

My family (dear Ol' Dad and his girlfriend) actually called me from the airport around 8:00PM... I asked if they had heard the news about the evacuation (which had ended by then) and they had not...

They said they would call if their flight did not leave as scheduled... so it must have left...

Keep in mind that this is Reno that I'm talken about... NOTHING happens here like this... Our only debated political issue is a nuclear waste dumb in the middle of nowhere...

Noswad

-- Noswad (noswad@endeavor-net.com), December 24, 1999.