Now that it is over and I have had time to clear my head, the whole thing is just ridiculous. Here is the story, as best as I can remember. I wish I had sound or video, but no time to prepare, and all my stuff was on the xray belt by then anyway.

I put my tool case through the xray like always. Usually, they pull it out at the end and open it up and at least do an ETD. Occasionally, they will run stuff back through. At the worst, they will take everything out and run enough swabs to wax a Lincoln. Not today.

Today he brings it back around to the entrance of the xray, stops the line, and insists that I remove "heavy" items as they can properly xray it. I tell him that this was not the place to do it, and he can take all the time he wants at the ETD machine. He is adamant that I must put things in the bin right there.

I say there are no heavy electronics but there are a lot of small electronics, and he is welcome to remove whatever he wants. He will not touch the contents and insists that I do it, but I have no idea for what he is looking.

When I get to my accelerometer power supplies he holds one up and says that it is a component for making an IED. "Do you know what an IED is?" he asked snarkily.

This set me off. "Do you think I am stupid? Yes, I know what an IED is and you think this is bomb making components, don't you?" Since he brought it up, I decided to go with it.

He mentioned my batteries, the power supplies, lots of wire (cables actually), and other things that he had no idea what they were but he was sure they were bomb making supplies.

So decided to empty my bag right there. I was digging stuff out and dumping it in the bin, and every time I did I asked if that was good enough or did I need to pull out more. I did not wait for an answer, and dug more stuff out and threw it in the bin. He picked up a power supply, the things he said could be made into detonators, and started flipping the switches. (Good thing he was wrong.) He pulled my strobe light out, and I was seriously afraid that he was going to point it at my face or his, or worse one of the 20 or so people watching this farce and fire the Zenon tube right in someones eyes. I grabbed it from him and put it in the bin. The whole time I was angrily remarking about being accused of having bomb making equipment and supplies and how stupid did he think I was.

Now I figure I am in for it for sure. I was ready to not fly today. Finally shove my stuff in the xray and go through the MMW and walk around to retrieve my stuff. It comes out of the xray and right to me. No ETD, no LEO, no retaliation grope, nothing.

Then I get a bit crazy. I am at the end of the rollers, putting everything back in my bag, making sure it is all there and I realize that he has accused me of a Federal crime and then did not call an LEO, a supervisor, or even run a single ETD swab. There was no chat down. No investigation. They did not ask for my travel documents.

I realized that I was the victim of an officious martinet that was not expecting push back from the fat old guy that had some knowledge.

I went straight to the supervisor platform and asked to see one. I then unloaded on how I did not appreciate being accused of having bomb making materials right in the xray line surrounded by a crowd of people. I gave him the full load of venom that was boiling to come out. I told him that my bag usually gets checked and I do not mind, but it is done at the appropriate place, not in a crowd of people and certainly not while being accused of a crime. He was nice and professional. He apologized for the screener's action and handed me a complaint card to fill out. Yeah, like that will do any good.