European Parliament – The terrorists’ best friend?
On 13/02/2010, in Battle stations, by cleo
They have done it again! After condemning full body scanners as being in conflict with human rights, the European Parliament now voted down the so called SWIFT accord, something that would have given US authorities more visibility of the funds being transferred between the world’s banks and hence would have enabled better tracking of the activities of terrorist groups. The European Ministers of Justice had approved the SWIFT accord but this was now killed by the EP. The reason? The privacy of European citizens was not properly protected under the agreement, some euro-parliamentarians claimed.
In case you have forgotten, the European Parliament is the circus that commutes between Strasbourg in France and Brussels in Belgium because European States could not decide where it should actually be headquartered and the members of which are chosen in elections with record low (and decreasing) turnout of European citizens. In 2009 the average turn-out across the Union was just 43 %…
Watching on TV as the good EP members cheered at this latest folly, one was reminded of a bunch of immature school children who had just pulled off a particularly nasty prank.
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Safety briefing – the missing element
On 28/01/2010, in Battle stations, by steve
This blog is about air traffic management. But, by the nature of our business, we tend to travel more than the average citizen and the pilots among us spend half their life strapped to the aircraft that carry us around. So it is appropriate to say something for once as a passenger rather than the ATM expert I often claim to be.
I am one of those passengers who actually follows the safety briefing, checks the location of the emergency exits and who has actually studied the operation of the damn things. I would hate having to read the opening instructions with smoke filling the cabin… I never take off my shoes until we are at cruising level. And yes, I do check that my life vest is under my seat and yes, I did find an empty container once and complained before we were airborne.
Recently however I started missing something from the safety briefing. If you look at the statistics, the likelihood of needing my life vest is distinctly lower than the need to know what I should do in case the chap or gal sitting next to me turns out to have explosives in his or her pants and decides to use it too.
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Is being blown up part of my human rights?
On 12/01/2010, in Battle stations, by cleo
It is bad enough that aviation is the target of people hell bent on blowing things up. It is even worse that there are others in pretty high places who will help them… even if unwittingly.
Violating human rights?
There is no point in denying that the aviation security system, including the extensive and supposedly fool-proof US elements, have failed miserably when it allowed a Nigerian guy with explosives in his underpants to board several planes on Christmas day. I can only surmise what his dad is thinking about all this when his noble act of warning the US embassy about his son’s activities went totally unheeded… Will he, or other dad’s in a similar predicament, raise the flag in the future or just shrug their shoulders? But there is worse…
Body imaging technology is a proven tool to discover this kind of plan. True, no scanner will (for now) see explosives tucked in body cavities but that will surely come one day. Or not…
The good ladies and gentlemen of the European Parliament maintain that full body scanning violates EU citizens’ human rights. In some EU states, the problem arises only if “sensitive” body parts are also displayed. Great! So what have the same nice, caring EU persons done to make aviation safer?
They decided that it was not their business!
While in the United States aviation security is seen as an important government task, in Europe security and its related expenditures are thrust squarely onto the shoulders of the flying community. Airline passengers pay through the nose for the privilege of not being blown up while politicians sit back contentedly… Would they be so relaxed if the threat was the same against the underground or the railways? Hardly!
Airline security does not bring votes… passenger rights and emission trading schemes do. So, focusing on the latter, Europe has never bothered to build a comprehensive, effective and cost-efficient security infrastructure for aviation.
Shooting their mouth off about protecting human rights and so eventually blocking the introduction of full body scanning is nothing short of being misguided on the grandest scale possible.
I would dearly like to know whether the MEPs really consider it preferable to be blown to kingdom come in the knowledge that no screener has seen their willy to arresting the one guy who is behind all the mischief. Makes you almost wonder: what is in the parliamentarians’ underpants?
Visiting Djibouti… 4
On 07/01/2010, in Battle stations, by krisztian
Sweating it out…
Everone had to have their temperature taken...
The heat didn’t seem to bother the locals, and especially not the people working with the national health service. As a welcome gesture from the land trapped between Eritrea and Somalia we received a thermometer in the ear and a H1N1 leaflet in the hand. Every passenger entering the Djibouti International Terminal went through this thorough inspection to make sure we were healthy. I still wonder how the thermometer registered normal body temperatures whilst I was sweating like a turkey at New Year.
Anyway, we were cleared of any illnesses and entered the small terminal, allowing us to start filling in the immigration forms. As fully trained professionals, we sought after a calm place to bow our heads and answer the questions while trying to write sensible sentences on melting paper. Ok, enough about the heat already, but trust me, it was really hot.
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Only heroes and luck stop terrorists today
On 28/12/2009, in Battle stations, by krisztian
It has been a long time ago since the media last brought us news concerning the airlines and terrorism. Until Flight 253 of Delta Airlines departing Amsterdam bound for Detroit came in the news. Second day of Christmas brought us back to reality. If you want to know what happened, you can read all the news items concerning this event. What interests me more, is what went wrong and why. Even more interesting, how can we prevent this in the future.
A lot of comment has been given concerning the fact that the passenger who now is labeled as a terrorist, was on Terrorism Watch lists, that his father had warned the US government about the activities of his son. People pose the question: how could such a passenger board a US bound flight? But why try to find the blame in a paper carousel that is so far away from the operations on the ground and the true security measures that have been put into place.
Consider the following. All US bound passengers have to go through profiling. Passengers coming from connecting flights from anywhere must at some point before heading towards US territorial airspace go through the profiling process. This process was set up to filter passengers with evil intentions. Airport security, the x-ray people, are there to filter all equipment which might be dangerous for the flight. So, what happened?
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Visiting Djibouti… 3
On 25/10/2009, in Battle stations, by krisztian
Addis and on
Once the plane started its decent into Addis, we were happy to be able to stretch our legs a bit after such a long flight. From the window of the plane, we could see Ethiopia closing in. Little farm houses surrounded by large fields of green, divided by dark flows. Watching the flight info display revealed that we were coming in high, meaning Addis must be surrounded by a mountainous area.
When the doors opened, our suspicion of mountains proved correct. Expecting heat to hit us, a relatively pleasant temperature welcomed us to Africa, with a slight breeze and even some rain drops that seemingly appeared from nowhere. Honestly, this was a good surprise, because our fatigue and anxiety could miss extreme temperatures like a tooth ache.
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Visiting Djibouti… 2
On 20/10/2009, in Battle stations, by krisztian
Arrival in Addis
Come the morning of the next day, we call ahead of our arrival to be sure that our passports were ready. The lady we spoke to yesterday answers the phone and advises us to call back a bit later as the consul had not yet arrived at the Embassy and she had no access to our files. We did as we were told… we waited.
In the afternoon, we called the Embassy again. This time with more result to it. The Consul wanted to see us, because our stories weren’t clear to him. This might sound a bit scary to most, but we had a surprise up our sleeves which would surely guarantee us passage to Djibouti, or at least a Djiboutian prison.
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Visiting Djibouti… 1
On 12/10/2009, in Battle stations, by krisztian
Pre-departure
My work takes me to different places in the world. All of them with their unique challenge and beauty and every time with a different reason for going. Close, far, considered safe or hostile, it doesn’t really matter, we go where we are needed.
Our visit to Djibouti started out in Brussels and proved to provide us with a challenge without even leaving our own country. If you think, whatever may be your nationality, that it is hard getting into the US, try visiting Djibouti with my background.
As we wanted to do things properly, we contacted the local Djibouti Embassy in Brussels. They kindly explained us on the phone to present ourselves at the Embassy with our valid passports, two ID pictures and a letter from our host in Djibouti as we had stated to be business visitors. My colleague and I showed up at the Embassy at 09h00 local time just as agreed.
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Bodyguarding – I’m armed, what could go wrong?
On 01/10/2009, in Battle stations, by krisztian
In fact, it is so obvious. Search Google for bodyguard courses and focus on promotional videos posted by the different companies providing the service. Mostly, the first thing you see is a firing range, students in position and drawing, loading and firing in some tactical manner. As the video continues, people demonstrate firing techniques from moving vehicles, in crowds, while wounded and so on.
If you search for PSDO courses it gets even heavier, as all students are armed with M4 or MP5 rifles, side strapped with what appears to be a 9mm, mostly a Glock.
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Roger-Wilco contributor honored
On 10/09/2009, in Battle stations, by steve
Security is an area that affects almost all facets of our life these days. Aviation security is but one of the many areas where highly trained professionals labor day and night to keep us safe. We try to bring you posts that introduce this fascinating subject in the widest sense of the word.
Most of the security related posts on Roger-Wilco come from the pen of “krisztian” who is not only managing the close protection team of RAP Security but is often out in the field, doing the hard work of the foot soldiers.
His dedication has recently been recognized by IBSSA, the International Bodyguard and Security Services Association, when he was presented with the award for “Your continuous outstanding service rendered to IBSSA”.
Congratulations to “krisztian” and our best wishes for many more safe and successful operations.
Terrorism – The Threat of Possible Attacks
On 04/09/2009, in Battle stations, by krisztian
The word “terrorism” is used in so many security related issues, that the true meaning of it has gone lost. If we look up terrorism in the dictionary the following is displayed:
Cambridge Dictionary of American English: “Violent action for political purpose”
The FBI (Federal Bureau of Investigation) is one of the largest institutions fighting terrorism and describes terrorism as follows:
“The unlawful use of force or violence against persons or property to intimidate or coerce a Government, the civilian population, or any segment thereof, in furtherance of political or social objectives.”
In the course of history the definition of terrorism has changed and things were added to it. As terrorism has been around since humans could walk it is not a new phenomenon. However it has become more public, more violent and focused on one certain perpetrator and one certain target.
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Two-way communication and the efficiency of public security
On 19/08/2009, in Battle stations, by krisztian
Strolling through the center of Brussels today my mind wandered off as my wife was shopping. I started an incognito surveillance of the security staff present in the mall, the different stores and the public areas. Of course, it was not all that hard to pick them out of the crowd, as they all wear clothing portraying the company they work for. This of course is done deliberately, if only to show the competition who is working where. More importantly, the clothing shows possible ‘threats’ that security is present and that somebody is keeping an eye out.
With the law on security being very strict in Belgium, everybody is aware of the fact that security officers can not do much in case of a crime… Nevertheless the men and women in the field do a good job. They show the public that somebody cares, that somebody is there to assist and in this they do succeed.
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Teach for the future
On 24/07/2009, in Battle stations, by krisztian
In every conflict, be it in business, world clashes, local disputes or the upbringing of our children, we have always said: “learn from the past.”
Learning from the past
For this reason even military academies study ancient wars and tactics used therein to teach their future military leaders. In my domain, security, we do the same. We base our training on the past, scenarios that we have seen, that our instructors have lived are replayed and countered in order to make us ‘ready’ for what awaits us.
This sounds logical; we can only learn from our mistakes and praise ourselves over our victories. And to a certain level this is true. We do need to learn from our mistakes and use the past to shape the present. However, it is exactly in this last sentence that we make the biggest mistake.
As we live in the present and head towards the future, the enemy of the present lives in the future, a step ahead, always.
Look at 9/11. Aviation security has changed since those events, some might argue for the better, some might say for the worse, but is has changed. We have adapted our security measures to something that has happened in the past. We have made it virtually impossible for terrorist organizations to perpetrate such an act again. But the terrorists know this, and they will counter us using our biggest weakness, the fact that we live and train for the present.
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