There was a curious incident at Dulles airport in Washington, D.C. on Saturday. There was a security lockdown, apparently for two hours. The curious thing is that when you take a stethoscope to the internets, there is only one single mention of the incident, on the DCist blog:

Dulles police confirmed reports from sources that Washington Dulles International Airport is on security lockdown. Flights are neither arriving nor departing at this time, and no passengers are passing through airport security. Police could not say at what time airport activities were put on hold, and police would not comment on the cause. Flight status as of 5:25 p.m. is still showing normal departures and arrivals. Transportation Security Administration agents said that no one at the information call center had any knowledge of the lockdown. Developing. …

UPDATE: As of 5:50 p.m., airport operations confirm that the situation has been resolved. Flights are getting back underway.

As it happens, I heard about this first-hand on Saturday afternoon. A friend who was stuck in a held-up flight to Munich called me. On their flight, the captain announced that the entire airport had been shut down while the authorities searched for someone. That person had been found, and normal activity was resuming, so they would be able to leave soon.

What is impressive is the complete radio silence. A major airport, in the nation’s capital, is completely shut down for two hours, and there’s not a peep on any conventional news medium? In my experience, that’s unprecedented.

(Or maybe it happens all the time, and we just never get to hear about it?)