Long airport delays caused by heightened security after fresh terror attack
27.12.09
Emergency security measures ordered by the US government yesterday after a 23-year-old Nigerian man tried to ignite an explosive device aboard a Northwest Airlines flight on descent into Detroit on Friday have led to chaos at Heathrow and other British airports, with delays reaching up to 5 hours, the Times reports. US security authorities instructed all airlines to impose the new tier of last-minute checks on all passengers flying to America within hours of a Nigerian man’s arrest over an apparent attempt to blow up a flight from Amsterdam to Detroit.
Every passenger flying into an American airport are now subjected to an extra ‘pat-down’ body search and will have their hand luggage examined at terminal gates by airline staff just before they board. The new measures were imposed indefinitely by the Transportation Security Administration within hours of the incident and are in addition to those already carried out by airport security. Until now, this extra level of security has been applied only to a small proportion of randomly selected passengers.
The US government has also ordered strict enforcement of the limit of one piece of hand luggage for each passenger, and airlines have been told that all travellers should remain seated for the final hour of any flight to an American airport, with no access to their personal items. The American authorities have also told airlines to suspend operation of their in-flight mapping systems, the displays on the in-flight film screens that show the location of an aircraft and how far it is from its destination. This has forced some airlines to disable their entire in-flight entertainment systems.
It was unclear how long the new restrictions will last, or how they will be applied after this initial post attack period is over. However, the Times reports that the new measures caused long delays for UK - US flights yesterday. Most flights from Heathrow and Gatwick to America were delayed by nearly three hours. Four flights bound for Miami around midday were delayed by almost four hours.
A British Airways spokesman told the newspaper that the new regulations were ‘challenging’, but added that no services were cancelled. A spokesman for BAA yesterday urged passengers travelling to America to arrive earlier and carry less hand luggage. BA, Virgin Atlantic and other airlines called in staff from their Christmas breaks to ease the backlog.
However, Norman Shanks, an aviation security consultant who, until 1996, was head of security at BAA, told the Times that the heightened rules imposed by the American authorities were impractical, only likely to cause congestion, and will have little improvement to passenger safety. He said: ‘Having two sets of people doing security checks is likely to make both teams relax. Suspending the in-flight maps is also unlikely to have any impact. People can see they are nearing landing by looking out the window, noticing the pitch of the flight or looking at their watch.'
He added that a limit of one piece of luggage per person would make people pack bags more densely, making it harder for scanners to identify threatening objects. He also noted that: ‘Richard Reid [the failed bomber of 2001] was seated when he tried to set off a bomb in his shoe - being seated is no assurance that someone isn’t trying to set off a bomb.’ A 'stay seated' rule could also have deterred passengers who tackled the Detroit flight bomber from taking any action, he said.
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