Anchorage airport police say a device they described as a pipe bomb was found in a passenger’s carry-on luggage.

Airport police and fire Chief Jesse Davis tells the Anchorage Daily News (http://bit.ly/1nFGulh) that Transportation Security Administration agents found the small explosive in the luggage of a man headed for a North Slope flight for oil company workers Sunday afternoon.

Davis says the device lacked a triggering mechanism, and no one was in danger.

Davis says the man claimed it was an “avalanche device.” The FBI was interviewing the man, whose name hasn’t been released.

Airport operations officer Sharon Long says agents cleared a 300-foot radius around the security checkpoint when they found the explosive.

Davis says a bomb squad took it away. Long says security was closed for about an hour.

(AP)