Sunday, April 13, 2008

Security issues at Shannon airport..

I am a regular visitor at Shannon airport. Either traveling myself or picking up - dropping of people. One thing that surprises me every time I go there is the lack of security.
Now I am not talking about the security inside the airport affecting travellers but rather about the perimeter security.
The airport is surrounded by an industrial estate, fields, a fuel storage facility and water. The only visible security is a little guardhouse manned by (at most) two unarmed airport security staff. Lately that checkpoint has also been unmanned.
I doubt it that there is any covert security.
That leaves a multitude of avenues of attack open to anyone with bad intentions.
Seeing that a large number of US troops travelling to and back from the Middle East make stopovers at Shannon as well as (allegedly) the odd rendition flight and visit by US dignitaries this would make it a high value target.
Now I am not going to outline details here as I do not intend to provide a manual for suicidal idiots. However off the top of my head I can come up with 4-5 possible attack scenarios with an above average probability of success. Combined that with the fact that terrorists nowadays are not too concerned with a escape route or their own survival rate and the tendency to commit suicide attacks that net a single digit number of "kills" and you can see where I am going.
I am sure that with the ERU being deployed in certain areas of nearby Limerick they can spare a few men to carry out a risk analysis and provide adequate perimeter security.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

The threat analysis for the region reveals nosig. You face a greater risk driving to the airport from Limerick than landing at it.

Evert said...

That depends Bernie. If you were intent on damaging US military assets an analysis of Shannon would potential make it look like a worthy target..