Airport "bomber" fined R500

[Gunship]

Soooo much for justice. Here is a new law - if you drink and drive and found to be overt the limit ... you loose your car. That's fine - untill you see this crazy "gesture" :}

The Civil Aviation Authority has expressed disappointment at the lenient sentence meted out to a Nigerian man who threatened to blow up Johannesburg International Airport, SABC news reported on Monday.

Temitope Oni told the Kempton magistrate's court he made the threat in the spur of the moment.

According to the report, Oni, who threatened to blow up Africa's busiest airport with the help of Osama Bin Laden, was fined R500.

Oni told staff of Nationwide Airline he would carry out the act if they insisted on him paying additional charges for excessive baggage.

He was about to board a connecting flight from London to Durban when he made the threat.

[canthover]

And he probably managed to finalise another drug deal or keep the 419 scam running!

[Islander Jock]

Having flown though JNB quite a few times over the past couple of years I always find it amazing that the pax who come from west Africa always want to cart the most baggage and then bitch the loudest when told they have to pay excess. Not to mention the fact that they feel they don't have to stand in que when immigration is a bit slow.:mad:

I laugh my tits off seeing them over at the payment counters forking out sums well in excess of $1000 USD.

Overall I think the checkin staff there do a pretty damn good job under the circumstances.

The Nigerian's latest on the 419 is a letter under the guise of a Sri Lankan widow whose husband has been washed away in the tsunami and left the usual monumental sum of cash in an account somewhere. They really are scum of the earth!!! At the moment, it looks like it will be a long long time before I have to visit that part of the wold again. Thank friggin god!

[yogibear]

:mad: ....It seems that they are a law unto themselves.....did anyone see the interview on SABC3.....talk about a cocky, self-centered idiot........and myself being very close to one of the Nationwide staff involved......I would have given anything to be there when he went off....call me old school if you know what I mean......I take my hat off to the check-in staff who did what they were supposed to and not to mention the crap they have to put up with every single day from pax who think they are god and that what-ever they say or demand MUST be done.....:mad:

Good stuff Nationwide :ok: :ok: :ok:

[chuks]

To a Nigerian, 'carry-on' is what you can carry on to the aircraft. It is that simple, really.

On my very first trip to Lagos I can still remember seeing this Nigerian gentleman arguing with the Lufthansa gate agents that a child's tricycle was too a carry-on item! I began to wonder what sort of a place I was headed for.

As you may be aware, a lot of Nigerians make a living or else just a side-job out of 'trading'; they shuttle back and forth to places such as London or Jo'burg to buy stuff they then re-sell back home. Of course they don't want to have to pay excess baggage charges! So they get as close as they can to the limit (from the far side) for checked-in baggage and then try to carry the rest onto the aircraft.

You can see some big, fat, Lagos market lady waddling and puffing down the aisle with a serious handbag, a carry-on bag and two bulging plazzie bags. Official weight: 75 kilos!

I remember once I almost had to visit a hernia clinic when I very unwisely pulled an innocent-looking blue suitcase out of the nose of my Cessna 402 when we were unloading in Escravos. Gravity took over in a big way, since that bag must have weighed about 40 kilos! It turned out to belong to an Escravos-based American helicopter pilot who had a little sideline in trading, himself! (You could tell when he had made a hit because all the locals would turn up in similar tee-shirts or cowboy hats.) I guess he had got a good deal on cast-iron frying pans or perhaps anvils, that trip.