‘You’re not the shooter, are you?!’ — My night at LAX
JP Mangalindan
Los Angeles International Airport. REUTERS/Bob Riha, Jr.
The first thing I notice as I make my way to baggage claim at Terminal 7 in Los Angeles International Airport is the screaming.
A wave of wide-eyed travelers sprint down a corridor towards me, arms flailing, dropping their luggage mid-stride. They’re shrieking and shouting unintelligible things. They shove at me, yank at my shirt, giving me a look I’ve never seen before: carnal fear.
“Get out of the hallway!!” an airport employee wearing a neon-taped sweater vest yells at me, waving me towards him.
“What’s going on?!” I ask.
“There’s been a shooting,” he says. “There are shooters in the baggage claim area.”
My stomach drops. My mom, who in recent months has grown more and more alarmist — first over a spate of shootings over the last 12 months and then over the false reports of gunfire at New York’s JFK Airport last week — had just warned me hours earlier to be careful at the airport. Shootings could happen anywhere, she warned, and now I worried she was right.
The door to a nearby elevator opens up. People race towards it, shoving me along — the rationale being that hiding in an elevator car is somehow better than being in the wide open. Of course, if there actually were a shooter, 15 people packed in an elevator would be easy prey.
When airport employees shout that hiding in the elevator is not an option, everyone spills out, running and crawling elsewhere for cover.
I make a move to join them when airport security tells me to get on the ground and not to move. I call my parents (my mom, stunned, gives me the same instructions), shoot off a few frantic texts to close friends, tweet and update Facebook. (Hey, I’m a millennial, after all.)
A middle-aged woman named Morgan, with silver shoulder-length hair, lies on the ground next to me. Morgan has just come back from visiting her daughter on the East Coast, and she’s on her iPhone telling her husband to stay away from the airport. She’s shaking and asks me to huddle closer to her for her comfort before a thought occurs to her.
“Hey, you’re not the shooter, are you?!” she whispers. “Because if you are, I have a family. I have a daughter who loves me, and a husband who’s expecting me to come home.”
“Honey, if I were the shooter, I wouldn’t be flopping around on the ground like a beached whale calling my Mom,” I retort, giving Morgan a wink. She laughs, relaxing slightly.
Six LAPD cops sweep past us down the corridor then, with weapons that looked like semi-automatic guns raised. I’ve been furiously texting my parents and friends, and the police ask me to drop my phone and show my hands.
“Did you see any shooters?” one asks. “Did you hear shots fired?”
Morgan and I shake our heads “no.” They instruct us to stay on the ground while they move toward the baggage claim area.
We’re allowed to stand up after a half-hour and make our way to Terminal 7’s TSA screening area, where other travelers huddle together, before we’re eventually herded outside the terminal. Hundreds of irritated, confused travelers stand on the pavement or sit on the curb, checking their phones for online updates.
“Hi there, what’s going on? Was there a shooting?” I ask two United Airlines (UAL) employees.
“Yes, there was a shooting downstairs in the baggage area,” one says. The other nods quietly in agreement.
Minutes later, online reports say that the LAPD has confirmed the supposed shooting was a false alarm. After another half-hour, police at the terminal confirm the same thing.
It’s a big relief for everyone, even the irritated people who are angry at LAX’s apparent lack of organization and communications. That friends and family as far-flung as New Jersey can tell me about the LAPD’s pronouncement way before I’m told on-site seems like an epic fail on the part of the LAPD and LAX.
All travelers still waiting for flights must go through security again, creating a line larger than the sort you see after Apple (AAPL) launches a new iPhone.
As for me, I’ve lost track of my luggage and Morgan. It will likely be hours before United sorts out this mess — the delayed departing flights, the swelling masses going through security — let alone gets around to finding my luggage. I decide to head home in a Lyft and revisit the airport the following day. I’m sweaty and exhausted.
“Screw this,” I mumble as my Lyft ride arrives. “I’m going home, changing into pajamas and ordering Domino’s.”
And you know what? Domino’s pizza never tasted so good.
JP Mangalindan is a senior correspondent for Yahoo Finance covering the intersection of tech and business. Follow him on Twitter or Facebook.
