A police cruiser caught fire just outside Terminal C’s baggage claim and arrivals area at New York’s LaGuardia Airport. A video of the blaze has gone viral.
According to reports, the terminal was closed for two hours on Tuesday as firefighters worked to extinguish the engine fire.
Traffic had already been redirected when the video was captured, which Brittany Aubert, the camerawoman, confirmed. In the video, the white SUV can be seen burning from the engine compartment. A police officer in a cruiser passes by, turns around, and looks at the fire.
After the site was cleared, the terminal reopened at around 5:45 a.m., according to police reports.
In more LaGuardia news, a man from New York was arrested in April at the airport after being caught trying to board a plane with a weapon. He said he “forgot” about the loaded handgun and the 100 rounds packed in his carry-on luggage at the security checkpoint.
On April 25, after the X-ray screening technology at the checkpoint triggered an alert, TSA agents (Transportation Security Administration) reportedly found a firearm inside the man’s “carry-on.”
Law authorities reportedly discovered the .22 caliber pistol with ten rounds in it and two crates containing fifty rounds of ammunition when they searched the man’s luggage, as reported by the TSA.
The man told investigators that he had transported his gun in the suitcase to go to a shooting range but had forgotten that the gun and ammo were in the luggage when he took it to the airport.
According to a recent survey, LaGuardia is no longer the least preferred airport in the United States.
In J.D. Power’s latest survey of traveler satisfaction in North American airports, released on Wednesday, the once-maligned Queens air hub placed just one point below “average.”
The research attributes the airport’s middle place to the recently completed, much-praised $4 billion Terminal B redevelopment, which was primarily responsible for LaGuardia’s dramatic increase in performance.
