I was not going to post any comment on the story of a stowaway hiding in the wheel-well of an SAA aircraft flying from Johannesburg via Dakar to New York City, and then I realised I had to. There is a profound security issue here. The fact that the stowaway managed to get that close to the plane is very scary and SAA should rethink their security at dodgy airports (I’m assuming that Dakar airport is dodgy). Hell, in a post-911 world, heads should roll and big fat fines should be handed out.
What is the point of scanning me down to my underpants inside the airport building, taking retina scans, fingerprints, stealing my nail clippers – name your invasive technique, when someone could potentially just walk up to the wheels of the plane and do their evil deed. I guess this fits right in there with Bruce Schneier‘s comments on Billions Wasted on Anti-Terrorism Security.
Think about it – replace one times frozen stowaway with one times time-delayed bomb and that plane could have “Lockerbied” all over Long Island and JFK airport. That would have been rather grim.