re: This just in: Nuclear weapons were on an Air Force plane!
I think the problem wasn't that the Air Force was moving warheads (on cruise missiles, in the account I read). It was the fact that the Air Force didn't know it was moving live warheads around.
This doesn't sound like a routine training mission, or a shuttle job, moving ordnance from A to B. Usually, warheads and missiles are stored and managed separately and only brought together for a high level alert. Practice is done with dummy warheads.
My guess is someone ordered a mission or exercise and simply picked the wrong code word out of a book,. setting the whole proess in motion. At any rate, it cost an officer his job.