If you "accidentally" brought a knife onboard a plane and didn't get caught, would you call a radio talkshow and brag about it?
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Man arrested after telling radio station he had knife on plane
He called from a cellphone before he boarded the Columbus-bound flight.
Thursday, January 24, 2002
Jodi Nirode and Matthew Marx
Dispatch Staff Reporters
A central Ohio man was arrested last night after he wore a 3-inch knife onto a US Airways flight from Pittsburgh to Port Columbus, authorities said.
Police and the FBI were tipped to the man after he called a Columbus radio show from his cellphone just before he boarded the plane in Pittsburgh.
He told the radio station that he had passed through airport security wearing the knife in a belt.
Port Columbus officials identified the man as Robert L. Hedrick, 37, of Delaware.
Last night, he was charged with one count of carrying a concealed weapon aboard an aircraft and was expected to be taken to the Franklin County jail.
A woman who answered the phone at Hedrick's home last night identified herself as his wife and said she knew nothing of his arrest.
"Excuse me? Are you for real?'' she asked. "My husband called a radio station? That makes no sense.''
She declined to say much more, saying she needed to reach her husband, but confirmed that he was on a flight yesterday.
FBI agents were waiting at the gate when US Airways Flight 1192 landed at Port Columbus shortly after 6:30 p.m.
One woman on the plane said that passengers were standing in the aisle, waiting to get off, when the co-pilot announced there had been a security breach.
"It was interesting, because everyone was pretty calm,'' said the woman, who asked not to be identified.
She said the co-pilot said, "First, let me say there is no danger here. The FBI has been notified.''
Passengers were told to take their seats, and then all men were asked to get off the plane. She said that when women were allowed to get off, she saw none of the male passengers and heard they had been taken into another area. It's unclear how long the men were detained.
Hedrick told the FBI that he simply forgot that he had worn a belt buckle with a concealed knife, Port Columbus spokeswoman Angie Neal said.
Hedrick had called The John Corby Show on WTVN (610 AM), saying he had just made it through security at Pittsburgh International Airport with the knife.
"He was in the (Pittsburgh) airport waiting to take his flight,'' the show's producer, Joe Bradley, said last night. "He had gone to the bathroom. He realized he made it past security and had not been detected. He was stunned by it.''
A Columbus radio listener called authorities, Neal said.
"He had no intention of doing anything ill-mannered toward anyone,'' Bradley said of Hedrick. "There was really nothing to it. . . . If there's anything to it, it points out the farce that's being foisted upon us that's called airport security.''
Police at the Pittsburgh airport said that Hedrick never passed through that airport's security because he had arrived there on a connecting flight from Greensboro, N.C.
Airport security officials in Greensboro said they weren't aware of any security breach.
US Airways wouldn't provide details.
"We are cooperating with local and federal authorities to determine what motivation this person had,'' said John Bronson, spokesman for the airline.
Flight 1192, which originated in Rochester, N.Y., carried 58 passengers and a crew of five on the flight to Columbus.
Hedrick called WTVN a second time from the plane after it touched down in Columbus.
But this time, Bradley said, the station didn't put him on the air.
Bradley said he could hear the announcement to passengers to remain in their seats and that FBI agents would be boarding.
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(I pasted the article instead of posting a link because the web site archives stuff after 7 days, and then starts charging you to view it.)
