Sheriff: Calif airport shut after explosive traces found on bag; material appears to be honey

Sheriff: Honey bottles cause Calif airport to shut

FRESNO, Calif. — The suspicious material found inside luggage that prompted the shutdown of a California airport Tuesday morning turned out to be five soft drink bottles filled with what appears to be honey, authorities said.

A passenger’s suitcase tested positive for TNT at Bakersfield’s Meadows Field during a routine swabbing of the bag’s exterior, Kern County Sheriff Donny Youngblood said. When Transportation Security Administration officials opened the bag, they found bottles filled with an amber liquid, he said.

The bag’s owner, Francisco Ramirez, 31, told TSA officers that the bottles were filled with honey, Youngblood said. He added that “it gives every appearance of being honey.”

Officials were testing the liquid to determine exactly what it is.

“Why in this day and age would someone take a chance carrying honey in Gatorade bottles?” Youngblood said. “That itself is an alarm. It’s hard to understand.”

Investigators said Ramirez is a gardener from Milwaukee who has been cooperating with authorities. He flew to Bakersfield Dec. 23 to spend Christmas with his sister and was returning Tuesday when the alarm sounded.

When TSA agents opened one of the bottles and tested the contents, the resulting fumes nauseated them, Youngblood said. Both were treated and released at a local hospital.

“It could be honey,” Youngblood said. “It could be honey mixed with something else.”

The Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Office bomb squad was performing further tests to determine why at least two positives were recorded for both TNT and the organic explosive acetone peroxide, or TATP.

Investigators want to know whether any chemical Ramirez uses in his gardening work could have left traces of potential explosives. They will also run tests on the substance to see if the smoke beekeepers use to subdue the insects could have triggered a false positive test on honey.

All flights into and out of Meadows Field were canceled for much of Tuesday as authorities searched the terminal for other potential explosives.

Ramirez was not arrested Tuesday. Authorities initially questioned his immigration status, but U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement spokeswoman Virginia Kice said Tuesday afternoon that Ramirez is a legal permanent resident of the U.S.

The discovery came less than two weeks after a man was charged with trying to destroy a Northwest Airlines flight as it approached Detroit. He is alleged to have smuggled an explosive device on board the aircraft and set if off, but the device sparked only a fire and not the intended explosion.

Airline security has been tightened since the arrest.

Associated Press Writer Dinesh Ramde contributed to this report from Milwaukee.