Via the BBC: False alarm diverts US-UK flight

A flight from Los Angeles to London was diverted to New York City’s JFK airport after the crew reported a suspicious passenger, US officials have said.

Police boarded American Airlines Flight 136 after it made an emergency landing at 0352 (0752 GMT) and detained a man of Middle Eastern descent, CNN TV said.

US Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said the man was an employee who was flying in a private capacity.

Mr Chertoff told CNN it may have simply have been a “misunderstanding”.

“I think the good news here, of course, is an alert crew sees something that’s anomalous or seems questionable and they take action,” he said.

Hmm, must’ve been a false gut-check.

The suspicious activity in question:

A flight attendant was reportedly concerned that a passenger had used the employee shuttle bus at LAX to board the plane and bypass security controls.

[…]

However, after questioning, it emerged the man was an American Airlines employee who had purchased a legitimate return ticket to London.

Shouldn’t there be a way to find that out with landing the plane in NY and wasting all that time?

Meanwhile, via the AP: Bogus company gets radioactives license:

- Congressional investigators set up a bogus company with only a postal box and within a month obtained a license from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission that allowed them to buy enough radioactive material for a small “dirty bomb.”

[…]

Nobody at the NRC checked whether the company was legitimate and an agency official even helped the investigators fill out the application form…

Spiffy.