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Not all airline security is created equal Last week's nasty pre-Christmas shock aboard a Paris-to-Miami airliner reminded Americans that security against terrorists is only as good as the weakest link -- and that link may be beyond our control. A less bumbling would-be bomber might well have brought down the airliner and killed all aboard. Investigators still are trying to piece together exactly what happened. What is known is that a man managed to board the American Airlines plane with an explosive substance, possibly C-4, in his shoes. When he tried to detonate the explosive with a match, an alert stewardess, then several other crew members and passengers, stopped him. Since the terrorists on Sept. 11 hijacked and crashed four airliners in the United States, much of the focus for increased security has been on keeping dangerous passengers and weapons off commercial aircraft. Government and airport officials admit it will take months, perhaps years, to implement security measures already conceived. Even then, they say, there is no guarantee terrorists will not find some way to get past security checkpoints. That's what happened in Paris. A Sri Lankan man, 28-year-old Tariq Raja, apparently had no trouble passing through a security checkpoint. C-4 plastic explosive is difficult to detect with scanning equipment and, apparently, no one thought to check Raja's shoes to ensure they did not contain contraband. We suspect thought now will go into methods of stopping similar attempts in the future. But no one -- in Paris, at least -- thought of explosive shoes before Raja's attempted airline bombing, just as no one at a U.S. airport worried about box cutters before Sept. 11. The frightening episode reminds us that terrorists, including individual maniacs as well as those belonging to organized groups, can be extremely innovative. It also reminds us that a large number of commercial planes flying in U.S. airspace come from foreign airports. Sometimes, they have foreign crews and a majority of their passengers are not Americans. We suspect Christmas was not a pleasant time for those charged with making airline flight safe for Americans. Raja reminded them that no matter how good U.S. security is, Americans must fear lapses by foreign governments and their airlines and airports. It is not a pleasant thought -- but it is one U.S. officials now must consider a priority. |
