For sale, cheap: pesky trinkets not fit for flying

Did you kiss your corkscrew goodbye at Boston’s Logan International Airport? Surrender your Swiss Army knife at Rhode Island’s T.F. Green Airport? Take leave of your trowel at Connecticut’s Bradley International? Relinquish your rolling pin at New Hampshire’s Manchester-Boston Regional?

If so, the odds are good that John Supry has the items. Or at least he had them -- until he sold them at rock-bottom prices for the greater good of the Granite State.

Sometimes, contraband rocks.

“We get a lot of rocks at Logan,” said Supry, manager of a state agency that handles federal and state surplus material as well as items surrendered at some other New England airports.

And they are surrendered, not seized, the Transportation Security Administration insists.

“TSA does not confiscate items at the checkpoint; the items are voluntarily abandoned,” said TSA Midwest public affairs manager Lara Uselding in an e-mail.

Your loss at these New England airports is New Hampshire’s gain, to the tune of about $26,000 per year.

New Hampshire handled only a fraction of the 9,835,349 passenger possessions turned over to the TSA during the first eight months of this year, but the revenue generated helps the state pay for storing and transporting surplus items and defrays the cost of federal surplus equipment distributed to state and local agencies.

“It’s worked out better than I thought,” said Supry, 52, in his office on a former dairy farm outside Concord. A 25-year veteran of New Hampshire’s surplus services, he admits he had his doubts when he began collecting swag snagged by airport security about two years ago.

“I didn’t think it was worth our time after the first time -- there were just so many scissors. So many scissors,” he said, shaking his head. He blanched at the memory -- bushels of scissors, up to 6,000 pounds a month from Logan alone -- before the ban on manicure scissors, small screwdrivers and similar items was lifted in December 2005.

Since then, seized scissors have been eclipsed in volume by lighters -- 37,000 per day around the country or about 80% of all items collected, according to the TSA. Bbut generally the lighters, like other hazardous materials, are destroyed rather than turned over to state surplus agents.

States wind up with a lot of Swiss Army knives and similar pocketknives. “They’re the next most popular things other than scissors and corkscrews,” said Supry, noting that the knives are almost invariably red. At the moment, he has 15 40-pound boxes of them, which he sells for about $300 per box.

Most knives are blank or bear the name of a company. A few are personalized. Martha Cruz and Howard Watkins, wherever you are, John Supry has your Swiss Army knives.

Some of the stuff is new and still in its original packaging. A rolling pin painted with chickens and something scrawled in indecipherable French still bears its $19.99 price tag, but it will be sold for chicken feed.

Other items have seen better days. In Supry’s inventory is a power drill, literally in pieces, that someone tried to take onto a plane. He’s also seen rusty tools, soldering guns, jumper cables, shock absorbers, brake pads, used car parts and, sadly, many ornate carving knives used by brides and grooms to cut their wedding cakes.

“There’s always bushels of corkscrews. I never realized people drank so much on vacation,” said Supry, leading the way through one of the former dairy barns that make up the surplus program’s complex. A big box containing dozens of corkscrews and a smattering of unmatched knives goes for $20.

“I guess people just don’t think a golf club is a weapon,” he said, looking over sporting goods that included two golf clubs, two pool cues, a cricket bat, a lacrosse stick, a hockey stick and assorted baseball bats, including small souvenir Red Sox bats.

“Always a lot of souvenir baseball bats at Logan,” he added. “Once in a while I find a Yankees one, but not too often.”

Though he wasn’t sure it fit in the sporting goods category, Supry pointed out a well-worn 6-foot leather bullwhip. He also noted certain unusual apparel.

“There’s a lot of studded leather items. I say a lot; it’s more than I would expect. You know, belts, bracelets,” he said.

Supry sells the goods to the public on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays. State agencies get the booty free from the airports; in exchange, airports pay nothing to dispose of the items.

Howard said he generally tries to distribute abandoned items like multipurpose tools and pocketknives to local police and fire departments and boxes of scissors to schools before they’re consigned to auction.

And, in case anyone is wondering about “Snakes on a Plane,” Supry and his colleagues don’t handle live items abandoned at checkpoints. In any event, the TSA’s Uselding says, “Snakes are not allowed onboard aircraft.”