Gun magazine found on Southwest plane from Burbank

A loaded gun magazine was found Tuesday on a Southwest Airlines flight from Burbank to Phoenix after a law enforcement agent misplaced it on a previous flight.

A customer noticed the ammunition on the floor of the 120-passenger Boeing 737 and handed it over to a flight attendant, said Paul Flaningan, a spokesman for the airline.

When the plane landed at Sky Harbor Airport, it was met at the gate by agents from the Transportation Security Administration and officers from the Phoenix Police Department.

After an investigation, it was determined that the magazine was left behind by a law enforcement officer who was on a previous flight. The officer had followed protocol for boarding the plane with a firearm, including declaring the weapon and dismantling it, but at some point during the flight he dropped the magazine, Flaningan said.

The Phoenix Police Department made contact with the agent, who confirmed he was missing the magazine, Flaningan said. His name and the agency he works for were not released.

Passengers who were to board a connecting flight at the airport were rescreened, and the plane was checked for weapons.

-- Stephen Ceasar

Comments

[shadowpark]

and yet we submit to sexual harassment by the tsa!

[sophie]

I have no problem boarding a flight full of passengers who pass through metal detectors, and if they set it off, are further screened, either by the wand or the normal, LIGHT pat-down (not sexual molestation which the TSA currently performs). I would feel perfectly safe. I think neither the digital strip search nor groping sessions make us any safer.

[uncle_vito]

Well I have a different kind of magazine. A playboy magazine and I also left behind.

I also get gun magazaines in the mail. One is called American Rifleman.

[Enlightenment]

All this over a flipping legal magazine that you can purchase at a book store. This is more proof why the TSA and Security are out of control. Hey morons...use your brain!

[Ron]

Thank God we have agents on the planes. Sure bets a cell phone and 911.

[Terri]

Idiots, my son was on that plane and it was not a magazine that you read, it was live ammunition. Thank goodness an alert passenger found it and not some wacko. Just thankful my son made it here safe and sound. BTW he was re-searched due to this incident and everyone involved was polite and professional. Thanks South West for bringing my son saftey here.

[charles in charge]

Thank you LA Times for reporting this as a magazine, someone obviously told you that "clip" is not the correct word in this context (unlike all the other media outlets calling it a "clip"). When it comes to firearms, the mainstream media gets the terminology wrong about 99% of the time. Thank you for getting it right, for once.

[SeattleConservative]

Big deal. Guy dropped a magazine with a few rounds in it. A bullet is pretty useless without a firearm to use it in, although I suspect many of us could fashion one our of stuff we found on the plane if the flight was long enough.
Radical Muslims don't depend on accidentally finding a magazine on a plane- they come prepared.

[Jay Scott]

Wow. Don't usually see so much misinformation in comments.

1- A "magazine" is the correct (technical) term for a bullet holder that goes into a semiautomatic firearm. Sometimes colloquially called a "clip." Most often, they hold 10 - 15 rounds (a.k.a. bullets).

2- You can't really do much with a magazine, even if loaded, without the specific firearm it fits into. (Okay, you could hit someone with it, and a Glock mag will fit -- I think -- any Glock. Or you could put it in a fire, and the rounds could go off. But you get the idea, I hope.)

[Nick N.]

When I first started to read the column I felt that some right winger had left a copy of "Shotgun News" at his seat but I was relived to find it was only a "loaded magazine." Fortunately there were no terrorists on board that gotten through "gropefest" with the matching frame in the same caliber or one that was skillful at fashioning and dyeng a bar of soap without a pen knife in the aircraft rest room. Gun case closed.

[Buzzkill]

Now all we need to look for is where he hid the rest of the parts of the gun.

Obviously a clever Al Qaida plot...