"if You See Something, Say Something."

Good for you Karyn. Thank you for being a decent & concerned citizen.
& you crack me up with the interviews and bad hair days.

Alert citizen - thanks being vigilant! I just saw something on the news about a store called Unclaimed Luggage that sells nothing but stuff people leave on planes and unclaimed luggage.

I couldn't believe the guard didn't exercise more caution. Union Station is a major transportation hub. It's not a flippin' Walmart!

" You live and you learn, or you don't live long ".

I find it hard to believe that his superiors would agree that it is proper protocol for abandoned bags. It must be on security footage.

I agree. That was just stupid on his part.
We need more security guards like Paul Blart. Surely he would've handled this situation with the utmost care.

still laughing over bad hair day.....
I'll let the others comment on the guard's stupidity.

I guess after a while you become complacent...
No, that's not possible. Who could become complacent about blowing up?

I should have titled this thread "If you see something, say something - then run!"

I was going to say " Security guard go kaboom ". Unfortunately there wouldn't be too many witnesses.

Speaking of hair ; Marlene yours is looking fabulous. Love the tousled Do.

Greetings Karyn, its wise to be observant and vigilant and regretfully we all still live in a very unpredictable world. It does not matter where you live homeland security still advises us all to always be observant regardless of our surroundings, it just may prevent a bad scenario. Thank you Karyn for posting this discussion and I am glad it was just an empty suitcase.

Cheers,
Michael Hoard Principal Actor, Artist and Photographer

Well done, Karyn -- and thanks for the wonderful read!

Well you're a hero in my eyes...

I think you should have reported the guard because certainly he/she is not smart enough to be working there.

Well it did teach you one lesson... never go out if you're having a bad hair day.
File that with making sure you have on clean panties without holes. LOL

Maybe the guard knew it was empty. Maybe it was placed there by security as an experiment to see if anyone would notice it was unattended and actually say something. His shaking the bag and opening it was intended to make you think he was investigating the suitcase. Had he called in the dogs it would have alarmed other people unnecessarily. Had he explained it was just an experiment word would get around and the experiment would no longer be valid. It would be an important experiment to find out how reliable the public was at observing and reporting. I don't know for sure, of course, but my theory isn't too far fetched.

And people are NOT observant. A co-worker and I once did a similar experiment. I was managing a movie house and my accomplice was running the snack bar. It was a slow night and we placed a coin on the lobby floor to see how long it would take for someone to pick it up. It was clearly visible to anyone as they walked in the front door, but we watched people go right past it over and over until one of our regular customers stepped inside and immediately said "OOH, there's a nickel!"as he put it in his pocket.

Even more amazing, once I was waiting at a busy intersection to cross the street. On the opposite corner I saw money, two bills, on the sidewalk. As I waited for the light to change several people walked over the money, but nobody saw it. When I finally got to cross the street I picked it up, twenty bucks!

Congratulations on being one of the rare people who notice.

ideally that is the best way to get rid of idiots. rent a cops hired by the place... hey go check that package for bombs....ummm ok.

they have tested that though. they placed a bag on a subway and left it. it went back and forth dozens of times. even cops didn't see it. i think they placed it in a park and no one said anything. despite the fact everyone carries cell phones. i think often its easier to simply walk away then to go through the trouble or being the cause of trouble. and often its hard to find a person you can talk too.

---Mike Savad
MikeSavad.com

I posted this on my Facebook page also and one of my friends wrote...

Oh you need a Bag story Blog! I saw one at the Boston airport, reported it (as did many others) and we waited probably 20 minutes before they brought a dog to sniff it before they touched it. Meanwhile, we watched as they let person after person sit at the counter with the empty suspicious bag at their feet.

A bunch of us deputized ourselves and informed the people who sat near the bag that the reason we were so far away was that it had been unattended for quite awhile and they were sending something or someone to check it out. Some of us took pictures, others tweeted. How odd, we thought, that it took so long to check this out. We could all die!

The dog finally came, he sniffed, wagged away bored. Interpretation--no bomb. The security guys took the bag and whisked it away. About a half hour later we began to board the plane and a man (about mid thirty) came around a corner and headed to the spot where the bag had been. We realized immediately he was the owner. We kept our heads down, eyes averted and boarded the plane. Funny that we felt guilty for doing the right thing!

It's easy to sit back and talk about the rent a cops as if they're too stupid to know what to do. I've been a security officer on and off since 2009 and would like to invite those of you who know it all to walk the walk for a few weeks and get back to me on how much you know then

On people not noticing -- which is not the same thing as noticing and not reporting. "Diffusion of responsibility" I think is what it's called when so many people see something everyone assumes someone else must have called the police or done something about it.

Kitty Genovese tragedy in 1964 brought that phenomenon to public attention.

"Hayee Eddie, thius is Jium over at the tickit winda. We got a laydee over heer showin me a suitcase she thanks is suspishus. I'm gohna go awn ov 'air and shake it to see whut's in it. Nawgh, we don't need no bomb dawgs. I'll be fine."

Cheryl, yes, I remember that terrible story, good point. Also, given the sheer number of people traveling in and out of airports every day, bags probably get forgotten quite often. The security officers are there every day, so I wonder how many lone bags they deal with on a daily basis. It's kind of a scary thought, though, I know.

That is because he really was not in law enforcement or ex-military. Back in the day, we would have called EOD.