Nov. 29, 2002
Report: EL AL using anti-missile systems on aircraft
By DOUGLAS DAVIS

LONDON. -- El Al is believed to be the only civilian airline to have installed anti-missile defense systems following FBI warnings six months ago that commercial airliners could be targeted by al-Qaida terrorists firing portable ground-to-air missiles.

According to a report in the London Times on Friday, most airlines noted the warning but few took any action because of cost - some $3 million per aircraft.

The system is said to be capable of sensing an approaching missile and deploying a false signal, usually a flare, to divert it. Heat-seeking missiles, such as the Sam-7s which were fired at the Arkia plane in Mombasa, are drawn to the flare and explode harmlessly beyond the plane.

The report also notes that civilian airliners are harder to hit than military jets, despite being much larger, because they emit far less heat.

The FBI issued its warning to civilian airlines after an attack on a US military jet at Dhahran in Saudi Arabia this year. The warning said that, "given al-Qaida's demonstrated objective to target the US airline industry, its access to US and Russian-made Man-Portable Air Defense Systems (Manpads), and recent apparent targeting of US-led forces in Saudi Arabia, law enforcement agencies in the US should remain alert to the potential use of Manpads against US aircraft."

The Federal Aviation Administration has considered the feasibilty of equipping US civilian aircraft with missile protection, but it concluded in 1999 that: "Since there have been no confirmed incidents in the US it is difficult to convince aircraft manufacturers and airlines of the potential cost benefits of making their aircraft less susceptible and less vulnerable to Manpads through the implementation of warning systems."

Philip Baum, the editor of Aviation Security International magazine, said that a $3 million defense system would add only 1.5 percent to the cost of a new Boeing 747.

"With every terrorist incident we tend to assume further attacks will be of a similar nature," he said. "After September 11, all the focus went on suicide hijackers getting into the cockpits. The response was to fit reinforced cockpit doors.

"But the new threat could be coming from a different direction. We need to look not only at the intent of a terrorist organisation but what it is capable of doing in the future."

David Learmount, safety editor of Flight International magazine, was quoted as saying that the aviation industry has been aware for decades that airliners are vulnerable to this kind of attack: "The question is why people haven't done it more often."

But he cautioned against calls for airlines to be forced to pay for expensive protection systems. "There are many other safety systems queueing up to be installed on planes which would save many more lives," he said.

A British Airways source said: "We would never say never to this type of equipment but our view at the moment is that it belongs in the realm of highly sophisticated military fighter planes." British Airways would have to spend half its $2.5 billion cash reserves to install the device on each of its 350 aircraft.

A source at Britain's Department for Transport said: "Technically it is feasible to fit these devices, but it would be extremely expensive and would not protect against all types of missile. We believe the best protection is good intelligence and security around airport perimeters."

The Times noted that 100 soldiers traveling on civilian charter aircraft were killed in two attacks in Sri Lanka in 1995, and in Afghanistan 52 people died when a Bakhtar Afghan Airlines aircraft was shot down in 1985.

"Only El Al, Israel's national airline, is believed to have installed missile defense systems," it added

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