Strategic experts have warned that some recent security incidents in different airports across the world could be ‘testers' by terrorists.
NEW DELHI: Strategic experts have warned that some recent security incidents in different airports across the world could be ‘testers' by terrorists.
Though some of these airline security incidents could be results of 'genuine innocence' of first-time travelers, the experts have asked airlines and aviation authorities not to ignore them as some of them could be terrorist probes with actual imminent threats.
They have also pointed out that there have been about two dozen incidents since August, leading to flight diversions, emergency landings, escorting of civil aircraft by air force fighters and arrests of some people.
Even as new measures were being introduced worldwide to check the emerging threats, the number of such incidents since August was much more than recorded in the past, these experts, who declined to be identified, said.
The incidents have ranged from alarms being triggered off by disruptive passenger behaviour, bomb threats and misuse of mobile phones in-flight. The Air Line Pilots Association International (ALPA), which is the largest pilots union in the world, recently came out with a report providing their perspectives on aviation security issues.
ALPA President Duane Woerth, while releasing the report titled 'Aviation Security: Five years after 9/11 Attacks, said the attack had "dramatically altered" the perception of aviation terrorism. An ALPA statement quoted him as saying that the security systems currently in place have remained "too focussed on finding objects rather than the intent to do harm".
Pointing out that less attention was paid to detecting those with destructive intent and more emphasis laid on identifying possible threat objects, ALPA recommended implementation of non-intrusive individual risk assessment.
As security experts pointed out that in some of these incidents, the sky marshals deployed in the aircraft for security were drawn out of their places and exposed, it recommended that trusted airline or airport employees be trained and used as "eyes and ears" of the security apparatus. Flight-deck and crew members should also be trained in self-defense.
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