Airport hai ya air force base!

With as many as four terror alerts in the past one week, Mumbai airport appears more like a battlefield than an airport.The high alerts from various intelligence agencies, and the stringent security checks that follow have made life difficult for passengers. A case in example in the Air India flight 310 to Seoul on Sunday, where passengers had already boarded the aircraft.

Tip-off

“We received inputs from South Korean intelligence agencies that there was a security threat to the flight. All passengers and cargo was deplaned and had to go through the security process once more,” said an airport official. Anti-sabotage checks with sniffer dogs and a bomb squad were carried out and passengers’ bags were frisked manually. The flight originally scheduled for 8.25 pm finally took off at 11:30 pm.

Security checks

“The high alerts causes considerable inconvenience to passengers. There are baggage restrictions and the security checks are more stringent. Flights are normally delayed for an hour on an average,” said an airline official. “We cannot take these inputs lightly and have stepped up our security process. It definitely inconveniences passengers, but there is no alternative to security,” said an airport security official.

Warnings

- November 12 - Korean Intelligence warns of security threat at an Air India flight

- November 11 – FBI warns of an Al-Qaeda threat to planes flying to the US

- November 8 - Airports on alert after anonymous email warning of a terror strike received at Trichy airport

- November 6 - A caller warns of a bomb threat on a Jet Airways London flight