John Montgomery
Presents This Week's
August 28, 1999
Creep of the Week Logo
Creep Logo by Alan Fraser
The American Airlines Drug Runners
Image: American Airlines Employee Getting Arrested
Rampant Ramp Rats 

My attitude towards drugs is pretty simple. As far as I'm concerned, if you're an adult, you can smoke, shoot, snort or stuff any substance into any body part you like. Feel free to spend vast quantities of time and money getting high, stoned, wasted or just plain stupid. It's your life, body and mind, and I won't be the least bit offended. Keep it to yourself, away from the kids, and you'll get no lectures from me.

However, my "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" philosophy does have some limitations. For instance, I'll become considerably less tolerant if you PUT HEROIN IN THE COFFEE OF A PILOT WHO'S FLYING A PLANE I'M ON!!!

This week, as part of "Operation Ramp Rats", federal narcs in Miami busted 58 American Airlines ramp workers, baggage handlers and food service contractors, as well as two agents with the United States Immigration and Naturalization Service, a United States Customs Service inspector and an off-duty employee at the Broward County Sheriff's Department, who worked as a baggage handler. Eight other people, including another seven airline employees were arrested in eastern New York State in a related case, and 10 Colombians were arrested over the weekend in Cali, Colombia, on drug charges. What were these Ramp Rats doing?
 

  • Stashing heroin in coffee containers in the planes' galleys
  • Hiding cocaine and marijuana in suitcases in the jets' baggage holds
  • Packing three hand grenades and a loaded pistol on board as carry-on baggage
  • Flashing their employee IDs to use employee-only doors so they could bypass security checkpoints, including X-ray machines
  • Devising creative hiding places for the contraband in all parts of planes such as overhead compartments, the small metal food carts the flight attendants use, wall panels, bathrooms, kitchen areas, cargo holds and inside the wheel bays


    • Did you ever wonder why after a flight, your baggage comes back to you battered, bruised and covered with white powder? Or why you'd see a ramp worker driving one of those little baggage vehicles containing just a single bag which he'd pack very carefully and then toss the rest of the bags (including yours) into a big heap? Surely you've wondered why that airline food tastes so funky and sometimes causes you to have violent and unpleasant flashbacks of your college dorm days.

    Wonder no more.

    Operation Ramp Rats got started after the aforementioned incident when an American Airlines pilot asked for coffee with sugar on a flight, but instead received coffee with heroin. He said it "tasted weird and weak." Don't you just hate it when they put weak heroin in your coffee? Investigators discovered 15 pounds of heroin stashed in coffee packs aboard the plane.

    So, some sage advice for your next flight: When they say you're restricted to two carry-on bags, tell them you need to have an extra one to hold your own cocaine which you brought because you heard the cocaine they've been serving with lunch has been cut with flour. Before you "deplane", check the overhead compartments for any personal belongings or dime bags. And don't let George W. Bush anywhere near your luggage.


    Let me know what you think at montgome@servtech.com

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