IT’S ALMOST 1 am. LAX should be quiet, free of the stressed parents and harried business travelers who fill its terminals outside the small hours. Not tonight. Behind a row of windows illuminated by a purple glow, three men swing pickaxes into furniture. What looks like a performance art piece or a crime is in fact the hasty demolition of a Virgin America lounge.
The demolition crew represents a fraction of the hundreds of workers filling Los Angeles International Airport tonight for a once-in-a-lifetime logistics jigsaw puzzle. Other teams are pulling down signs, unplugging computers, and hauling away boxes of paper—and putting everything back in order on the other side of the airport.
