Simulating SAM Attack On Commercial Aircraft

Across the US, airports and airlines are staging exercises that are supposed to improve their ability to defend against a shoulder-launched missile attack on commercial aircraft. There's no fresh intelligence suggesting such an attack is on the way, according to the TSA. But it is an election year, and the Department of Homeland Security says it could certainly happen.

The Washington Post reports local police, airlines, airports and community groups have been co-opted in the exercises. Officials and citizens talk over ways to prevent a variety of scenarios that, unchecked, would lead to the downing of a low-flying commercial aircraft.

"The focus is largely on our reaction to the threat and coordination" with various agencies and property owners near airports, according to TSA spokeswoman Yolanda Clark.

What's interesting about these latest exercises, according to the Post, is the apparent shift in focus among the participants. Last year, you might remember lawmakers on Capitol Hill had $6 billion burning a hole in their collective pocket, money to be spent on equipping civilian jetliners with missile defense systems. Companies like Raytheon and Israel's IAI went to work, quickly coming up with some alternatives that could cost more than $1 million per aircraft.

But Congressman John Mica (R-FL), who was an early champion of that idea, has recently had a big-time change of heart. "There are a whole host of problems," he told the Post. So, instead, he wrote legislation passed last week by the House Aviation Subcommittee (which he chairs) calling for a speeded-up review of anti-missile technology. He also wants the Bush administration to do more to curb the proliferation of shoulder-fired SAM technology worldwide.

The commercial aircraft industry appears to be having second thoughts as well. When ATA President James May testified on Capitol Hill last week, he said adding missile defense systems to commercial aircraft would be like "putting a Volkswagen bus on the belly of an airplane." The expense of installing and maintaining such a system would be prohibitive, he said.

But the idea of equipping commercial aircraft with anti-missile systems still has its proponents. Israel's flag carrier, El Al, is already working on a program to put missile defense capabilities aboard its fleet. An airline in Thailand is doing the same thing.

"Once, God forbid, one US airliner will be blown up by a missile and we will lose hundreds of innocent lives, you will see how the government will not only have $8 billion [for the technology], the government will have $16 billion," said Isaac Yeffet, former director of security at El Al, in an interview with the Post. "We need to act."

Besides, Mica said, if we wait around for the FAA to go through normal certification procedures, a lot of us won't have to worry about flying with them. We'll be too old to travel. "If we go through the normal process of FAA certification for this equipment, it might not be until our kids are flying as adults that we see these things on aircraft," Mica said.

FMI: www.dhs.gov