Sport Pilot Talk

drseti · Joined: 28 Nov 2009 Posts: 1390 Location: Lock Haven PA

As we reach the tenth anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, this little bit of security theater from Homeland Security caught my eye:

Quote: "Violent extremists with knowledge of general aviation and access to small planes pose a significant potential threat to the Homeland," according to an intelligence bulletin issued by the Department of Homeland Security and the FBI.

We all know how much damage these small planes can do when they bounce off of buildings! Full story from CNN at http://edition.cnn.com/2011/US/09/04/terror.planes/.

Now that you know DHS is watching us, don't you feel much more secure??

Jack Tyler · Posted: Sun Sep 11, 2011 5:30 am Post subject:

Paul:

'Security Theater' is, I'm afraid, a fitting term. An excellent, 3-part series running on slate.com right now offers an explicit perspective on the actual risk of terrorism today, something Homeland Security (HS) has never done. These are extracted from Terror, Security, and Money: Balancing the Risks, Benefits, and Costs of Homeland Security. Bottom line, from the data assembled: A risk of a serious event is very small, exceedingly small.

The series starts here: www.slate.com/id/2303167/

The threat from a terrorist using GA aircraft? The increased physical security at GA airports and the new screening procedures associated with student pilot training aside, there are other barriers to GA being a significant threat. Most planes available for rent have little mass and limited load carrying. An emotionally disturbed student pilot flew a C172 into the side of a Tampa office building while I lived there - the plane just wedged itself into someone's office, and building repairs were relatively minor. The guy who flew a PA-28 into the Austin IRS building - a fully fueled plane hitting a building with 200 employees mid-morning on a work day - caused two deaths and two injuries plus a lot of fire damage. Tragic for the families impacted by the act, no doubt an emotionally difficult event for all those affected, but hardly on the scale of a significant, destructive act that 'terrorism' implies. And what is the social environment like at your airport? Can someone rent a hangar to rig up a sizable explosive package inside a GA a/c, and be around your airport for a period of time while working inside a closed hangar without anyone noticing? Can someone load up a rental plane with bulky packages and go unobserved? Don't the a/c owners at your airport know - or at the least, recognize - one another?

Does GA pose some level of threat? Sure, altho' far less than a Ford F-250 panel truck. How much risk? On the far side of 'tiny', it would seem.

[From article #3: "Is it possible to measure the risk of terrorism? Measuring risk can be difficult, but it is done as a matter of course in such highly charged areas as nuclear power plant safety, airplane safety, and environmental protection. There is adequate information about terrorism: There is plenty of data on how much damage terrorists have been able to do over the decades and about how frequently they attack. The insurance industry has a distinct financial imperative to understand terrorism risks to write policies for it. If the private sector can estimate terrorism risks and is willing to risk its own money on the validity of the estimate, why can't the Department of Homeland Security? "]