Even Mickey Gets a Closer Look at Airport

IRVINE —  Twelve-year-old Craig Johnson was startled Thursday when the burly security guard asked to search his plastic bag, which had just gone through the X-ray machine at John Wayne Airport.

“But it’s just Mickey,” the boy protested with a puzzled look as the officer rummaged through the black-and-white bag emblazoned with the smiling face of the world’s most famous mouse. Out came a Mickey sweat shirt, a Goofy sweat shirt and something on the X-ray screen that appeared as a round, unidentified object.

Turned out, it was just a glass bottle of apple juice.

But as the guard explained apologetically to Craig and his mom, with the threat of the Unabomber still unsettling airports across California, officials “can’t be too careful.”

On Thursday, a full security alert continued at John Wayne Airport in response to a letter from the mysterious Unabomber that a bomb would explode aboard an airliner at Los Angeles International Airport before the Fourth of July.

Though the serial bomber reportedly said later in a missive that the threat was a hoax, the Federal Aviation Administration’s orders that airports implement full security measures continue. At John Wayne, that means more security officers and passengers being required to show photo identification.

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“We will continue to maintain security at this level for as long as necessary and until the [FAA] directs us otherwise,” said Pat Ware, spokeswoman at John Wayne. “Because of these measures, we are experiencing some [delays] for both curbside checking and in front of the counter.”

Personnel and security at the airport were further burdened Thursday by the heavy volume of holiday and weekend travelers, Ware said. Moreover, some worried passengers who had tickets to LAX had rerouted their trip through John Wayne instead.

“Everything adds up to longer delays,” Ware said.

And most passengers, some of whom have to wait in ticket lines for more than hour, were being good-natured about the whole thing.

“I feel better that they’re being so careful,” said Lisa Johnson, who with her son, Craig, came to the airport two hours before their 2:15 p.m. departure flight. “It’s amusing to think that an apple juice bottle could be threatening, but there are a lot of crazy people out there and if this is the only way we could screen these things, I don’t mind the wait.”

They might not have minded the delay, but passengers said they were still nervous.

“I am not an alarmist but today, I was watching what other people were doing. I was watching my bags and I was even watching the security guards watching bags,” said a 45-year-old Yorba Linda resident who was heading to San Francisco for a piano recital with her daughter. The woman asked that she not be identified because “who knows who might be reading this,” she said.

“You notice the announcement,” the woman continued, “and you can’t help but be aware of the potential danger.”

Over the public address system, an announcer continued repeating warnings to passengers to pay attention and not abandon their luggage and to report any suspicious activities to security.

“Until I land in New Jersey, I won’t feel safe,” Michelle Umberger, 42, of Rancho Santa Margarita said between recorded warnings. “It’s a risk--flying--anyway, but all this just adds” to the sense of potential danger, she said.