"Airport offers to mail confiscated items home free"

Friday, May 14, 2004

Airport offers to mail confiscated items home free 
By AUDREY PARENTE
The Daytona Beach (FL) News-Journal

 
DAYTONA BEACH -- Pointy sewing scissors lurked in Elaine Burgler's purse as
she dashed through the security checkpoint recently at Daytona Beach
International Airport.
 
The super-sharp cutters had made it here, tucked in her luggage, aboard a
plane from New York. But for the trip home, after a month-long vacation
during April in New Smyrna Beach, Burgler forgot to pack them in her checked
luggage.

Had this happened in Orlando, Miami or Tampa, Burgler's scissors might be on
e-Bay, an Internet auction site, by now -- where some confiscated items end
up from those larger airports, officials said.

At the local airport, Burgler was given several choices, including a chance
to stash the scissors into her luggage, surrendering the item to be sent off
for burial at Tomoka Landfill, or mailing the scissors back home -- for
free.

She chose to jot her name and address on a 9-by-11 inch mail-back envelope
and headed off to board her plane.

"I think it's a wonderful idea," Burgler said of the service provided by the
airport.

"We want our passengers to have a good experience," said Stephen Cooke,
director of business development for the airport. "We are always looking for
things our competition can't match."

A mail-back courtesy might be unaffordable at most large airports, Cooke
said, although there is a commercial alternative at some large airports.
According to Alan Kaufman of New York, his company, Self Defense Inc.,
offers mail-back envelopes bearing three 37-cent stamps, for sale at many
airport newspaper shops, including Orlando International, for $6.95.

Free mail-back was fine with Burgler, but not if it cost her money.

"I have had the scissors for years and years," said Burgler, of Tonawanda,
N.Y. "I thought I would never see them again. I think the mail-back is
wonderful, but if I had to pay to mail them, I would not."

Jack Abbott, Daytona Beach's airport administrative officer, said postage
for Burgler's scissors was paid for by the airport. The package was sent to
her home, along with a letter and a gift of luggage tags, he said.

More than 2,000 items have been returned by mail since the program began in
February 2003, according to airport log sheets. The highest total of
returned packages occurred in February 2004: 309 mail-backs, costing
$314.63.

While passengers aren't allowed to bring sharp metal scissors with them onto
a plane, security rules have changed considerably since the days of seizing
tweezers, nail clippers and knitting needles, which now are allowed, Abbott
said. And since the Transportation Security Administration has issued a
consumer list of permitted and prohibited items that can and can't be taken
aboard a plane, at www.tsa.gov, consumers are better educated, he said.

Before the changes, items left behind by passengers piled up. In May 2003,
the airport cleaned out the cache.

"We had 86 pounds of scissors, knives -- what we call dual-use items -- and
45 pounds of hazardous material -- lighters and lighter fluid, aerosol spray
cans, small bags of fertilizer," he said.

Regulations require inappropriate items be "divested by poundage" to federal
or state agencies for official use or destroyed, Abbot said. He called
Volusia County Landfill to pick up the property from his airport.

In the past year, the airport has accumulated less than 10 pounds of such
items, Abbott said.

"We get some unusual items, being the race track is here," he said. He
described race-credential holders with large pins among the offending items.
"And being close to Disney and other attractions, we get a lot of replica
guns." One passenger tried to carry aboard coiled-metal dog-leash anchors,
he said.

Josef Grusauskas, solid waste director at the county landfill, said usable
but hazardous items, such as butane lighters, go up for sale on an "exchange
shelf" at the landfill site.

"The rest, considered 'sharps' -- pointy things people could get hurt with
-- are treated as special waste," Grusauskas said. Those items are
"neutralized" -- either destroyed or buried, he said.

At Orlando, Miami or Tampa airports, things are done differently. Seized
items are picked up every six weeks, alternately by the Surplus Property
departments of Alabama and Kentucky, said Loren Stover, spokeswoman for the
Transportation Security Administration under the Department of Homeland
Security.

"We pick up about 4,000 pounds in Florida," said Chuck Gebon, spokesman for
the Kentucky agency. "We bring the items back and go through them. We sort
the items."

Some items go to city or county departments within Kentucky, including to
schools, and to such groups as Boy and Girl Scouts and nonprofit
organizations, Gebon said.

Better items, such as brand-name multitools and knives, are bundled in lots
for sale on e-Bay for competitive bid, he said. Recently, for example, 29
buck knives had a bid of $239.50, 27 Leatherman pocketknives had a bid for
$164, and 125 pounds of chrome and stainless steel scissors had a bid of
$101, he said. The state gets the proceeds.

Burgler's scissors, however, hadn't made it home after 12 days, she said in
a phone interview from Tonawanda.

"I'm not exactly biting my nails over those scissors," she said, "but I do
miss them, because I use them all of the time. For now, I have horse
scissors that are big and clumsy, and I am using them."

Did you know? 

Just where did the word "tweezers" come from? 

   . The word derives from the French word "etui" or "etwee." The Old French
version was "estuier," which meant to guard or hold or to keep safe.

   . An estuier was a small container that held small tools, such as
toothpicks, needles and pincers. Eventually, the name for the container
became the name for the pincers, or tweezers, evolving into the word we use
today.

SOURCES: The Word Detective,
American Heritage Dictionary 

Shoes off cuts wait time  

Daytona Beach International Airport travelers have the option of removing
their shoes before passing through metal detectors, according to the
Transportation Security Administration. However, the chances of a passenger
being asked to endure a more thorough secondary screening are higher if the
shoes are not removed and put through X-ray machines. 

Security lines are more likely move faster if all passengers remove their
shoes, according to agency guidelines. Boots and shoes with metal or steel
toes are more likely to set off metal detectors and must then be screened
with hand-held wands, which slows the clearance process. 

Attached Photo:

At Daytona Beach International Airport, passengers carrying small items
confiscated for security reasons are given several choices, including a
chance to stash the item into checked luggage, surrender the item to be sent
off for burial at Tomoka Landfill, or mail the item back home for free.

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