The 10 Strangest Items TSA Kept Off Planes This Year

A grenade-shaped trailer hitch, a replica exploding vest, dead seahorses in a bottle and a golden hand grenade — these are a few of the strangest items that Transportation Security Administration officers confiscated at airport checkpoints this year.

“So, what sport do you play with this bat?” blogger Bob Burns asks about a baseball bat wrapped in barbed wire. Here he gives us the top 10:

Also not cleared for travel — a terrifying movie prop of a corpse.

In slightly sadder airport security news, TSA posted this photo of a giant bear that it said was not acceptable hand luggage.

“Why does this gigantic teddy bear look so sad,” TSA wrote on Instagram. “He was abandoned by his owners at LAX after the airline and TSA determined that he was just too big to be screened as a carry-on and taken on the plane.”

Click on the link in our profile to read a blog post on this subject. ***UPDATE*** After watching a YouTube video posted by the traveler, we’ve learned that he’s a popular YouTuber and this was a stunt to see if he could get the giant bear on the plane. He even made up a backstory that the bear was a gift for his girlfriend. The bear did not belong to a child. The passenger had actually bought a ticket for the bear. After the airline and TSA decided the bear was too large, the airline offered to refund the ticket and the traveler was given the option of checking the bear as checked baggage. The traveler opted not to check the bear and left it behind.*** Why does this gigantic teddy bear look so sad? He was abandoned by his owners at LAX after the airline and TSA determined that he was just too big to be screened as a carry-on and taken on the plane. It’s a good idea to check with your airline prior to traveling with overly large items as cary-ons. If you see this wayward bear strolling the streets of LA, please feel free to feed him. #TSATravelTips

A photo posted by TSA (@tsa) on Dec 14, 2016 at 2:21pm PST

The reality is a bit more complicated: TSA later updated the post to say that this was actually a stunt from a “popular YouTuber to see if he could get the giant bear in the plane.”

Article source: http://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2016/12/16/505907965/tsa-shares-the-ten-strangest-items-they-kept-off-planes-this-year?utm_medium=RSS&utm_campaign=news

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