LONDON – The bombs used in the cargo plane terror plot were at least 50 times more powerful than would be needed to blow a hole in an aircraft fuselage, officials said yesterday.
Experts in Germany said the bombs at East Midlands Airport and in Dubai contained at least 300g of the powerful explosive PETN as British home secretary Theresa May announced a review of all air freight security.
UK explosives expert Sidney Alford told CNN last year that just 6g of PETN would be enough to punch a hole in a metal plate twice the thickness of an aircraft fuselage.
Prime minister David Cameron, who chaired an hour-long meeting of the government’s emergency committee Cobra yesterday, said every possible step must be taken “to work with our partners in the Arab world to cut out the terrorist cancer that lurks in the Arabian Peninsula”.
Ms May told MPs both bombs originated in Yemen and were believed to be the work of al- Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (Aqap). “The devices were probably intended to detonate mid-air and to destroy the cargo aircraft on which they were being transported,” she said.
While there was no information to suggest another attack of a similar type was imminent, the authorities were working “on the assumption that this organisation will wish to continue to find ways of also attacking targets further afield”, Ms May said.
Announcing the security review, she said all flights containing unaccompanied freight from Somalia would be suspended. The suspension, which came into force at midnight last night, was a “precautionary measure” based on “possible contact between al-Qaeda in Yemen and terrorist groups in Somalia, as well as concern about airport security in Mogadishu”, Ms May said.
Ink cartridges larger than 500g will also be banned from hand baggage on flights departing from the UK and also on cargo flights unless they originate from a regular shipper with security arrangements approved by the Department for Transport, Ms May said.
The plot was a “stark reminder of the harm our enemies wish to inflict upon us”, she added.
The bomb at East Midlands Airport was removed from a UPS aircraft by Leicestershire police officers shortly after 3.30am on Friday following a tip-off from Saudi intelligence. It had travelled through a UPS hub at Germany’s Cologne airport before being detected in the UK following the tip-off, officials said.
But neither the prime minister nor the Home Office were told about what was happening until around lunchtime that day, Downing Street said. US president Barack Obama was kept “fully informed” since Thursday night, officials said.
Norman Shanks, former head of security at airport operator BAA, called for “package by package” screening after it emerged that one of the cargo plane bombs was transported on passenger aircraft before being found.
But Ryanair chief executive Michael O’Leary warned against over-reacting, saying he feared a new raft of “ludicrous” airport security measures.
US deputy national security adviser John Brennan aired fears about the extent of the latest plot, saying “it would be very imprudent . . . to presume that there are no others (packages) out there”. – (PA)