Ellen Pompeo detained by airport authorities, bomb squad over sunflower seeds

Ellen Pompeo faced an hour-long detention by airport authorities and the bomb squad, all thanks to a bag of sunflower seeds that set off alarms.

The Grey's Anatomy star opened up about her tense-turned-funny encounter with the Transportation Security Administration when she set off alarms with her sunflower seed snack during her flight last March.

“I had a bag of sunflower seeds, like organic sunflower seeds from Erewhon, so they were probably the most expensive sunflower seeds money can buy. They literally held me for an hour, and they brought the bomb squad in," Pompeo shared during her interview with Travel + Leisure.

She recalled asking the officials, "'What is happening? Is this a joke?'" to which they replied that it was "most likely a chemical on the packaging of these super expensive, fancy, organic, clean sunflower seeds" that triggered the alarm. "My protein on the plane!” she added.

Per the interview, Pompeo tried to board the plane by offering to just throw them away, but the authorities said she needed to wait for the bomb squad to finish assessing the unopened bag of sunflower seeds.

"I almost missed the flight. It was really like no one would ever believe this! I was texting my publicist saying, 'I might not get on this plane, and you're never gonna guess why,'" she added.

During the interview, she revealed that her travel essentials include mints, glasses, water, hand sanitizer, and baby wipes to do that "Naomi Campbell thing and wipe down the entire seat," as well as snacks, like sunflower seeds.

She also shared that the Grey's Anatomy co-stars she'd like to travel with are T.R McKnight, who played George O'Malley in the series, and Katherine Heigl, who played Izzie Stevens.

Pompeo is a mother to her three kids, Stella Luna, Sienna May, and Eli Christopher, whom she shares with her husband, music producer Chris Ivery.