warbird1 wrote:
So, what happens if you land a warbird in California that has dummy bombs underneath it? Does it get confiscated? Do you get a citation or what?
What an assinine rule.
When they passed the law about ten years ago, we went to Cable Airport in Upland for a fly-in about two weeks after the law took effect. We had the usual Chino contingent of BirdDogs and Stearmans. Frank Vranicar had his L-19 with the four dummy bombs under the wings.
The Ontario Fire Dept. showed up. Evidently one of the firemen is part of the bomb squad. He proceeded to go nuts about the dummy bombs and demanded they be removed from the plane so he could confiscate them. Frank showed him they were fiberglass bodies with real tailfins but the guy didn't care. Finally after much discussion he decided they could remain but stated they should be removed in the future. Then the fireman looked in the cockpit and saw two dummy grenades hanging on web gear on the seatback. He went and got an Upland cop and proceeded to confiscate the grenades. No mention was made of the M-1 carbine next to the front seat, he just wanted those grenades. The fireman also confiscated dummy grenades from a vendor at the show.
The cop was actually pretty cool and stated he would have had Frank remove the grenades from plain sight and put them under the seat but the fireman was a jerk and demanded the grenades. We even got the cop to handcuff Frank V. so Frank Mormillo could take a picture which was then put in Pacific Flyer and the look on Frank V's face was priceless.
The next week Frank V. called the Ontario Fire Dept. and raised holy heck. They asked him to come over to the station and when he did the fireman who had confiscated the grenades returned them to Frank V. and made an apology. It turns out the Fire Chief was pissed his boys left the city while on duty with the equipment and went to the airshow and acted like the Gestapo.
I do believe they have since interpeted or changed the law to allow museums or historical displays to have them.
Les