A passenger surprised screeners at Los Angeles International Airport after she sent her month-old grandson through the X-ray machine in a plastic bin intended for fliers' personal belongings. In an event the Los Angeles Times (free registration) calls "bizarre but not unprecedented," the baby was first noticed by a screener who caught the child's outline on the X-ray machine and immediately pulled the bin backwards out of the x-ray machine. The baby was taken to a local hospital, where doctors determined the infant's exposure to radiation from the X-ray machine did not hit dangerous levels.
The unidentified 56-year-old woman who sent the baby through the machine apparently did not understand English, something that may have contributed to the mix-up, according to the Times. The paper adds that "the rare incident drew attention to whether officials are staffing often-busy security checkpoints enough to prevent such an accident." The Times cites TSA spokesman Nico Melendez in writing that "the agency doesn't have enough workers to constantly stand at tables in front of the screeners to coach passengers on what should or should not be sent through X-ray machines."
