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Did The Plane Leave The Gate? | ||||
2010-05-05 | ||||
There has been some confusion over the actual arrest of Faisal Shahzad last night at JFK and whether the plane left the gate as well as how he was allowed on the plane in the first place. This is how a law enforcement official explained it to NBC News in the last hour:
The plane was then cleared to leave the gate and did so. Moments later, officials thought better of it and decided they needed to rescreen passengers and cargo and brought the plane back. In other words, the plane never actually left the gate with Shahzad on it.
CBP officers discovered the suspect's intentions to leave the U.S. based on a lookout created by CBP earlier in the day and acted on that information to apprehend him." NBC's Jim Miklaszewski reports that a senior U.S. official familiar with events surrounding the capture of Shahzad says if the security system had worked properly, "He should have never been able to get on that airplane."
But the official says Shahzad's name should have set off alarms throughout the ticketing and boarding process before he ever buckled his seat belt. The system should have first been triggered when he purchased the ticket. If he purchased the ticket before his name was placed on the "no-fly list," then the airline and authorities should have been alerted when he got his boarding pass, either from an agent or one of the self-service kiosks. That's especially true on an international flight, because his passport would have been electronically scanned before he was issued a boarding pass. Even at the boarding gate, there are systems that alert TSA and customs officials to someone on the "no-fly list" attempting to board a flight.
"She was just attempting to put lipstick on a pig," the official said. "If that plane would have gotten into the air, heads would have rolled. We need to do a better job." | ||||
Posted by:Steve White |
#7 Ed, I wish I'd said that! It is one of the funniest things I've heard re politics. LOL :) |
Posted by: JohnQC 2010-05-05 17:10 |
#6 Well, politics is show business for ugly people and Napolitano was born for the role. |
Posted by: ed 2010-05-05 14:41 |
#5 "[Napolitano] was just attempting to put lipstick on a pig" Sounds like a self-help program t'me...... |
Posted by: USN, Ret. 2010-05-05 14:35 |
#4 "Yeah, let the plane take off and we'll see if he blows it up! Then we'll nail him for murder!" Geniuses. Napolitano's not qualified to flip burgers at McDonalds. |
Posted by: Parabellum 2010-05-05 08:39 |
#3 I read they let the plane move to see if he would make one more cell phone call. Posted by: BrerRabbit I will always believe that is one of the reasons why the authorities permitted Fort Hood shooter Hasan to carry on for so long. |
Posted by: Besoeker 2010-05-05 07:38 |
#2 I read they let the plane move to see if he would make one more cell phone call. |
Posted by: BrerRabbit 2010-05-05 07:19 |
#1 I heard the audio recording this morning. They called the pilots back from the taxiway. They were rolling, and the pilots were confused, so they called back to inquire about the delay. I heard that exchanges as well. So it seems the 'law enforcement official' was uh... mis-informed. |
Posted by: Bobby 2010-05-05 06:21 |