Limerick, Ireland Workshop July 10, 2000

Good Morning,

My name is Bob Monetti. On December 21, 1988, my twenty-year-old son, Rick, was returning from studying at Syracuse University in London. He unfortunately was flying on Pan Am Flight 103. All 259 passengers and crew were killed when the plane blew up over Lockerbie Scotland. 11 people on the ground were also killed as the fiery wreckage fell on the town.

In March of 1989, the group, Victims of Pan Am Flight 103 (VPAF103), formed. The group gave me the job of aviation security. I've been working on aviation security issues for the past 11 1/2 years. I am the VPAF103 representative on the US FAA Aviation Security Advisory Copmmittee (ASAC). I served as the only "civilian" member of the Baseline Working Group in 1996. I've worked as a consultant to the FAA for the past 3 years. I am a member of the ACI-NA Public Safelty and Security Committee. And, up until this year, I was a member of AAAE. I have attended many aviation security seminars, symposia, and meetings; and have spoken at several. I have toured most of the U.S. category "X" airports and all of the EDS manufacturers.

Just before this trip, I spent 3 days in Detroit helping with recurrent training of pre-boarding checkpoint screeners and checkpoint screening supervisors. These are the "dummies" who, in the US, work for minimum pay, don't care about security and get abused by passengers, crews and airport law enforcement officers.

I'm here to tell you that, while they are under paid, they aren't dumb and they do care about security. During the breaks, some of the screeners asked me some questions that I didn't want to answer, like:

• Why do we have to "turn on" pagers and cell phones? Can't they both turn on and also be a bomb or a bomb timer?
• In the X-ray machine, we look for complete IEDs. Couldn't the bad guy assemble the IED on the plane?
• We look for explosives in the carry-on bags, but couldn't the bad guy carry the explosives in his pockets and just walk through the magnetometers?
• Where do "They" examine all those cases of food and merchandise (hot dogs, soda pop, beer) that gets wheeled through the exit aisle - the ones that don't go through our X-ray machines.?

The security conscious screeners must really loose sleep because they see some of the obvious holes in our security systems. Maybe that's why they look like they don't care? Passengers, on the other hand, have a very "rosy" view of aviation security; one kind of like the one the FAA presents. Passengers and the general public just assume:

• That the screeners of hold luggage and at the checkpoints have the training, the proper equipment and the interest to prevent anyone from getting any dangerous weapons or materials aboard their plane.
• That all the checked baggage is screened before it goes on their plane.
• That ther is no chance an unaccompanied bag could get on their plane.
• That the airports in the US are responsible for screening just like they are in the rest of the world.
• That we can rush through the screening check points quickly because we wasted so much time waiting in the check-in line.
• That ther is a single, coordinated, ari traffic control system in place to maximize safety and minimize delays - not like what exists in the EU today.

I never said that passengers were well informed!

In January of 1998, the FAA conducted a test in Mobile, Alabama. They bought an old Lockheed L-1011. They filled several LD3 containers with unclaimed luggage and pressurized the plane to 9 PSIG. In one of the suitcases, was a small improvised explosive device (IED). The bomb was smaller than the size we look for with the CTS5500. Here's what that device did to that aircraft....... [video shown]

This test was fully instrumented as well as filmed (Not like Bruntingthorpe). There are several takes from each of several angles. Regular video, slow speed video, and ultra slow motion (high speed) film. The bomb was in a similar location as the bomb on Pan Am flight 103, and of similar size. The result is also similar to when the cockpit is instantly sheared off from the body of the plane.

This is what can happen when a bad guy gets a small bomb past our "security system". Can the systems and procedures in place now at your airport prevent this? Can they prevent it most of the time?

As if this were not upsetting enough, all the fuel, plane parts, and passengers then fall to the ground. It it's over your city, it could be a nightmare. Here are some photos taken of the little village of Lockerbie, Scotland a few days after Pan Am 103 fell on it. Every house had some damage. Many houses burned to the ground partly because one of the engines severed the water main.

What do passengers expect in the new millennium? It may or may not seem reasonable to you in the aviation industry, but most people do not enjoy the experience of flying. They fly to do business or they fly to go someplace pleasant. They do not fly for the sheer joy of flying. The experience is often uncomfortable and unsettling. Flying to Europe this time, my flight from Newark Airport was delayed 22 hours, then we sat on the ground for 3 more hours. the air conditioning was on; but only in first class! We had booked a flight on BEA to Limerick from Glasgow. At the airport, we were directed to the Jersey European counter. The plane we boarded was marked Air France! Is this normal?

Passengers expect that you will try to minimize their discomfort and confusion. And, oddly enough, they expect that you - the airlines and airports - are protecting them. Most passengers understand that protection cannot be a 100% proposition. But they certainly expect that you, the airlines and airports, are doing all that a reasonable person would do given the threat circumstances.

Your government aviation agency has regulations about safety and security. And you must follow them. These regulations may or may not provide actual safety and security. That's not relevant. You and the airlines and the airports are responsible to the passengers. You must do what is prudent and necessary. You must provide actual security, not just the appearance of security!

When the next air disaster occurss, and the chief executive of your company or authority says, "We've met all the government regulations", I will personally hound your chief executive to the ends of the earth.

It is not my goal or the goal of VPAF103 to bring the aviation system to a screeching halt with excessive, unrealistic, cumbersome and ineffective security measures. (That's the FAA's job). It is our goal to encourage airports and airlines to integrate prudent, intelligent security measures into your routine operations. There is much that can be done to improve the odds against terrorists at little or no extra cost and with little or no impact on schedule.

As an alternative, consider the havoc that will be visited on all of your houses by the regulators, by the legislators and by the flying public when the next Ramsey Yousef decides to blow up 9 or 10 wide body aircraft on the same day... and he succeeds.

Bob Monetti

Robert G Monetti
President, VPAF103
(856) 428-9013 or (609) 405-6169
bobmonet@mindspring.com