PetaPixel‘s Anete Lusina has a good summary of last weekend’s travel news: “Man’s Vintage Camera Mistaken for Bomb, Causes Emergency Landing.”

She reports:

“A passenger flight was forced to make an emergency landing in NYC this weekend after a woman mistook a fellow passenger’s vintage camera for a bomb. The incident reportedly occurred after a woman spotted a fellow passenger scrolling through videos and photos of vintage cameras. She mistook the images of vintage cameras for bombs and believed that the passenger was looking up bomb-making instructions. The woman’s fears peaked after the man pulled out his own vintage camera and began fiddling with its settings — she believed that he was setting a timer on a bomb’s detonator. She then notified a flight attendant and the pilots decided to land in Queens. The suspected terrorist was pinned to the tarmac before authorities figured out he was a camera enthusiast.”

Here’s a visualization of the plane to tower communications:

She concludes with:

“The suspected terrorist was forced to lie face-down on the ground and be searched. His bags were also confiscated and searched, and they only revealed a skateboard and other vintage cameras. After being detained several hours by Port Authority police officers and federal agents, the vintage camera enthusiast was finally cleared of any wrongdoing and released. Port Authority spokesman Tom Topousis said that “The JTTF [Joint Terrorism Task Force], the FBI and the Port Authority Police Department determined that there was no criminality on the part of the passenger and he was released.”“

My take: I really want to know what that “vintage camera” was. Also, I found it quite interesting that the witnesses had such different stories. The moral of the story? Don’t fiddle with your f-stop mid-flight? Don’t adjust your aperture on a plane? Maybe just: avoid the U.S. at all costs?