Congressman Exposed

A U.S. congressman was forced to strip to his underwear before boarding a flight to Detroit -- because screeners didn't believe he had a metal hip.

Michigan Democrat John Dingell told the Detroit News about his experience Saturday. He couldn't convince private Northwest Airlines guards at Reagan National Airport outside Washington that his artificial hip could be setting off the alarm.

First they made the 75-year-old remove his overcoat, then his suit coat, then his shoes and socks. They then took him to a back room where he removed his trousers and a security employee waved a metal-detecting wand over his boxer shorts.

"They felt me up and down like a prize steer," Dingell said.

"I complied, but tried to do it with some small bit of dignity," the Washington Post reports him as saying. "It seems to me that there was some incompetence involved here."

The screener appeared to be unaware of Dingell's status as a congressman, and Dingell stressed that he never mentioned it during the ordeal, said the Post.

U.S. Transportation Secretary Norman Mineta heard about the incident and said he would look into it, Dingell said.

"I asked Norman to check to see if they treated me like they do everybody else," Dingell said. "I just wanted to be sure that what they did was necessary, that I got the same treatment, no better or no worse, than anyone else."

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