Flights Evacuated at Orlando Airport Today After Camera Battery Exploded

A lithium ion camera battery exploded in a suitcase before security at the Orlando airport Friday evening. Some passengers reported that it sounded like a gun shot, however it appears to have been an accident and not an attack of any kind.

The TSA ordered that all passengers who had cleared security had to evacuate the terminal and be re-screened. And all passengers that were onboard planes that had not yet taken off returned to their gates to get off, leave the terminal, and be re-screened — but they reportedly had to wait to disembark until TSA arrived to supervise the deplaning.

The government sent everyone out pre-security when they thought there might be an attack. A massive backup of travelers at the airport, of course, would have been a tempting target had anything nefarious have been planned.

Of course if anyone had brought dangerous items through the checkpoint the plan was to send them back through the same screening that failed to catch it in the first place. So that makes sense.

And these are the batteries that the US federal government required be checked into cargo holds as luggage, because somehow they were trying to keep us safe. The farce continues.

About Gary Leff

Gary Leff is one of the foremost experts in the field of miles, points, and frequent business travel - a topic he has covered since 2002. Co-founder of frequent flyer community InsideFlyer.com, emcee of the Freddie Awards, and named one of the "World's Top Travel Experts" by Conde' Nast Traveler (2010-Present) Gary has been a guest on most major news media, profiled in several top print publications, and published broadly on the topic of consumer loyalty. More About Gary »

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Comments

  1. Indeed. The fact that the TSA *knows* they are doing a bad job is reflected in the fact that they won’t let lounges have lockers for carry-on bags. For “safety” reasons.

  2. I was there last night during this incident. This was a complete disaster and had it been an actual emergency, the ineptitude of the Orlando International Airport would have claimed many lives. When lines were formed to get rescreened, it was getting close to mob rules at times. There was not an airport official to be found. Rarely, one would by silently. This went on for hours. Thousands of people trying to create lines with no guidance. Every trash can was overflowing and every bathroom was disgusting. Because of an obvious remodel occurring, most electrical outlets outside the TSA area weren’t working. People had boarding passes on their phones!!! After 5 hours of waiting, phones were dying. The only restaurant that stayed open in my terminal was Burger King and they ran out of most food. There was ZERO communication on where lines formed or ended and ZERO order. For this airport administration to claim they had this under control in an orderly fashion is asinine. Epic fail on the part of that airport. THE INTERCOM WORKED JUST FINE, by the way. That’s how you communicate, you half witted idiots. People were, maybe for the first time ever, listening to EVERY announcement. What an embarrassment for the state of Florida. As a side note, VIRGIN Atlantic was the only airline that had it together. They searched with large signs for their passengers, found them and ushered them to their planes. They were incredible, the others, not so much. Sadly, i was on Frontier, the greyhound bus of airlines. Last time i ever fly with them. Ever.

  3. Didn’t statistics come out recently that the TSA is still missing over 80% of things in checked bags? Theatre of the absurd. And, agreed that that is absolutely a perfect target for several different kinds of terrorists attack.

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