Some people are born stupid, others try extra hard to catch up :
Back in the late 1970s when I was still living in New Orleans I was cleaning the nacelles on a Beech King Air when some teenager passing through (back then you could drive right onto the ramp & into the hangars) started doing chin ups hanging from the left horizontal stabilizer.
When I told him to knock it off there was almost a fight.
His daddy stood up for him until I told him I had their car plate numbers and ANY damage would be reported to the Feds and the owners of the airplane.
They left pretty quick after that.
Fast forward 15 years : I'm working at the Museum of Flight in Seattle and I happen to look out the window to see daddy hoisting two 5 to 6 yr olds onto the wing of the B-47 so they can run up the wing & look into the cockpit.
I hot footed it outside and asked him to get the little darlings down before one of them fell off and got hurt (top of B-47, hmm, maybe 15 feet to concrete = LAW SUIT !).
Of course he was all OFFENSIVE and not the least apologetic until I again said "I have your plate numbers ....." then all 3 of them disappeared faster than the Road Runner.
You may have had a bit of a snubbing, but considering that the Post 9/11 regulations for access to ANY hot part of an active airport (ie, inside the fence or outside a hangar where you have direct access to aircraft) are tough and vigorously enforced with some pretty hefty fines/punishment EXCEPT under certain conditions.
When the airplanes were being displayed and flown, that was one thing, an accident/incident scene after the close of public display is another.
Yeah, they could have been more polite about it, but if she was from the FAA or if not and had had the FAA in her face a few times that day I can see how it came off as it did.
None the less I'd go back and check out the museum again and see how you're treated the next time.
If it happens again then you have a more solid case.
(Follow up : About 3 years after I left New Orleans I went back to visit and went to that same hangar I had worked out of for several years & started to take a couple photos of some of the airplanes I had worked on or flown, I was immediately shown the door and told if I did it again, including shooting over the fence, I'd be arrested and THAT was years BEFORE 9/11 !
Airport security is nothing new, but after 9/11 it went to a whole new level & I hate it.)
Wheels UP-Water
Wheels DOWN-Land
DO NOT confuse the two !
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