STUCK Dallas Airport Terminal Romp Video Ignites Security Debate

by hearit

"Stuck": it's a video of two guys' midnight romp through the Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport after a canceled flight, including their harmless hijinks in the otherwise boring and deserted spot. The scenario isn't far removed from scenes in Tom Hanks' "The Terminal" but the videoed antics ignite a security debate over the DFW hub.

Joe Ayala and Larry Chen were traveling home from "While on our way home from Formula Drift Palm Beach when the pair found itself stranded without a flight, overnight at Dallas airport. Their flights home had been canceled. The duo maintained what it calls a "brief summary of the events that took place that night" at Dallas airport -- captured on video footage, and titled: "STUCK".

In the meantime, Board Members are feeling a bit stuck after apparently feeling like the airport's on the hot seat for the seemingly-unsupervised romp through the terminal.

Video includes the guys racing each other through Dallas-Fort Worth airport's empty terminal corridors in wheelchairs -- receiving a puzzled look from a vacuuming janitor, who simply turns around to continue vacuuming.

The pair then tests out the PA system at American Airlines Gate A-14 -- followed by one pounding the keyboard of an empty computer while the other does a handstand in the background, bumping into the American Airlines poster.

An empty shoe-shine stand is up next -- one shirtless friend buffing the other's sneakers.

Those antics are followed by soap-tossing across a bathroom before the two head into a closed restaurant at the airport. One finds himself in the restaurant's kitchen, to locate a beer glass -- and returns to the restaurant's main bar where he pours a glass of beer from an open tap, and downs the beer.

Escalator fun follows the beer: One performs a worthy set of spins on the moving handrails, while the other shoots down the rails in a fast slide. And, finally, there was handstands in a tram.

So who are the two guys of Dallas Airport infamy?: Ayala and Chen are automotive photographers who just happened to be traveling with $30,000 in camera equipment when they became effectively stuck in limbo, at Dallas-Fort Worth. The pair decided to make the most of their long night of travel -- choosing to film the escapades that now have some at the Dallas hub feeling a bit sheepish.

But not all:

David Magaña, manager of public affairs at Dallas-Fort Worth International (DFW), says Dallas Fort Worth officials actually they had their eye on the pair during the entire escapade over June 5, but that staff couldn't help being amused. The official airport statements includes: "DFW Airport, together with its security partners, maintains a high level of security at all times, and at no time did the filmmakers' activities present any level of danger or threat to flight safety. And by the way, they also picked up after themselves, including the restroom."

DFW Airport does admit there may need to be better security for the closed restaurant -- which seemed to offer open beer taps for the traveling comrades.

Chen told the media: "I wasn't actually going out to steal beer. I washed the cup and put it back in the fridge. I wanted to leave no trace. I didn't want to cause any trouble."

A member of the Dallas airport's board of directors has been a little more uptight about the prank, telling CNN affiliate KTVT-TV in Dallas-Fort Worth: "It's not funny. It's not going to happen again as far as I'm concerned. It should not have happened because it gives the perception the airport is sitting out there unguarded and that's why I was concerned, and am still concerned," says Betty Culbreath.

Better not increase the restaurant's security: It seems Betty needs one of those beers.

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