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| Two Men on Chicago-to-Amsterdam Flight Arrested | |
| 2010-08-31 | |
| Two Men on United Flight from Chicago Arrested on 'Preparation of a Terrorist Attack' in Amsterdam Ahmed Mohamed Nasser al Soofi, of Detroit, MI, and Hezem al Murisi were taken off a United Airlines flight in the Netherlands and have been charged by Dutch police with "preparation of a terrorist attack," according to a U.S. law enforcement official. U.S. officials said the two appeared to be travelling with what were termed "mock bombs" in their luggage. "This was almost certainly a dry run, a test," said one senior law enforcement official.
In addition, officials said, al Soofi was found to be carrying $7,000 in cash and a check of his luggage found a cell phone taped to a Pepto-Bismol bottle, three cell phones taped together, several watches taped together, a box cutter and three large knives. Officials said there was no indication of explosives and he and his luggage were cleared for the flight from Birmingham to Chicago O'Hare. A neighbor of al Soofi told ABC News he is from Yemen. | |
| Posted by:Free Radical |
| #22 But this guy gets jugged... Yes, but he agrees he should have been, so that's ok. |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2010-08-31 21:06 |
| #21 But this guy gets jugged... |
| Posted by: tu3031 2010-08-31 19:05 |
| #20 Two arabs with bomb-like devices are allowed on the plane and arrested after it lands. Great job, TSA! Ah but it is! Can't grab americans in america and put them in overseas Q&A shops. But Americans in Holland? Easy peasy. Welcome to club waterboard! |
| Posted by: flash91 2010-08-31 17:41 |
| #19 And they wonder why we don't want that mosque there. |
| Posted by: anonymous2u 2010-08-31 14:45 |
| #18 15: Pre runs will also include more than one attempt on a target to determine what levels of redundancy will be nedded to meet mission. I only wonder how many got through on this dry run. |
| Posted by: 49 Pan 2010-08-31 13:12 |
| #17 Annie Jacobsen has a nice summary over at Pajamas Media, in which she raises some very good questions. One update so far, no doubt more to come. Separately, people are getting jumpy, heading toward September 11th. Nine apparently Pakistani men were removed from a Tampa-bound United Airlines flight after one of them said something that made a flight attendant very uncomfortable. The were later rebooked on another flight. |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2010-08-31 12:40 |
| #16 Mizzou: It may have been a design flaw someone decided to take advantage of. |
| Posted by: Thing From Snowy Mountain 2010-08-31 12:25 |
| #15 In support of your comment Mizou, many years ago there was a KC-130 catastrophoic explosion at altitude on the O'Hare approach near Elgin, IL. The AFRES crew and some 20+ Space-A straphangers perished. The largest piece of the wreckage could have easily been hauled away in a Ford Ranger. The disaster was determined to be an internal antenna spark which touch off leaking fuel, which had collected in the belly of the fuselage. So, while I remain skeptical due to the sheer number of hours flown in this platform, your father's theory about a 747 design flaw could very well be accurate. As Dr. Steve very correct notes, El Al security is, for obvious reasons, the very best in the business. Our own TSA at the larger hubs is sadly, little more than a government, uniformed welfare program. Surly customer treatment aside, Atlanta's Hartsfield-Jackson is particularly disgusting and appalling. The fact that the suspects allegedly "did not know one another" might only indicate that it was a professionally executed, compartmented effort. One dry-runner fails in his airborne mission, the mission backup dry-runner continues undetected and unawares. This could represent a logical Tactics, Technics and Procedures (TTP) methodology for a future 'live-fire' mission. I pray the authorities are making the correct assessments and taking appropriate actions. Considering the agencies involved however, my confidence level is not high. |
| Posted by: Besoeker 2010-08-31 12:06 |
| #14 "The system worked." J. Incompetano |
| Posted by: Muggsy Glink 2010-08-31 11:49 |
| #13 Besoeker, my old man was an engineer for Boeing before he retired. He said the engineers that worked on that class were worried that something like that explosion might happen sooner or later. I accept that it was a design flaw. |
| Posted by: Mizzou Mafia 2010-08-31 11:26 |
| #12 Move it along, nuthin to see here... WASHINGTON – A U.S. government official says the FBI's investigation of two men detained in Amsterdam is finding that it's unlikely they were on a test run for a future terror attack, even as Dutch authorities continued to hold the pair on suspicion of conspiring to commit a terrorist act. The U.S. official says the two men arrested in Amsterdam did not know each other and were not traveling together. The official, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss the ongoing investigation, says both men missed flights to Dulles International Airport from Chicago, and United Airlines then booked them on the same flight to Amsterdam. The men were sitting near each other on the flight. Another U.S. official, who also spoke on condition of anonymity, says that when Customs officials discovered one passenger was not on the flight from Dulles to Dubai, they called the plane back to the gate and removed his luggage. It was then they discovered suspicious items in his bag. I know that when I travel, I always tape my cellphone to a Pepto bottle, bring 3 extra ones and tape them together so they don't get lost, along with extra watches, box cutters, large knives...y'know, the usual stuff. |
| Posted by: tu3031 2010-08-31 11:13 |
| #11 One hopes TSA inspectors realized that it was a dry run, and let it go on to see where it led. They are allowed to open any suspicious checked luggage, to see what's actually inside, after all. The box cutters and knives were a curious touch -- Messers. al Soofi and al Murisi wouldn't be able to access checked baggage during the flight, after all. |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2010-08-31 10:58 |
| #10 Yeah, it’s troubling they got on the plane with this stuff. But thank goodness, it doesn’t appear there was any “racial profiling” or anything intolerant during the screening process. |
| Posted by: DepotGuy 2010-08-31 10:42 |
| #9 Gee, I sure hope the first order of business was to determine their 'path to radicalization'! |
| Posted by: Sleque Barnsmell1141 2010-08-31 10:06 |
| #8 The ABC Evening News last night started its report on this last night with a "Well, Diane, there may be a perfectly innocent explanation for what happened" from Brian Ross. |
| Posted by: Anguper Hupomosing9418 2010-08-31 09:36 |
| #7 A Yemeni's cleared to fly with a box cutter and three large knives? Has nothing been learned since 9/11? Oh, but at least it seems profiling wasn't employed. So their feelings weren't hurt. /sarc |
| Posted by: Bulldog 2010-08-31 08:34 |
| #6 Ref #1 TWA Flight 800 that is. |
| Posted by: JohnQC 2010-08-31 08:01 |
| #5 I know a pilot who flew this specific plane and route. He retired before the crash. He did not believe the fuel tank theory either. |
| Posted by: JohnQC 2010-08-31 08:00 |
| #4 Besoeker makes a good point: sure, they didn't have 'explosives' in their luggage. But if someone else had smuggled the explosives on board, the plane would have gone kaboom. Get rid of the TSA as it is. Hire the Israelis to provide airplane security. They at least know what they're doing. If we must have an American-run TSA, I want it run by retired master gunnery sergeants and chief petty officers. |
| Posted by: Steve White 2010-08-31 07:57 |
| #3 Two arabs with bomb-like devices are allowed on the plane and arrested after it lands. Great job, TSA! |
| Posted by: Parabellum 2010-08-31 07:10 |
| #2 Perhaps all electronics should be placed in a RF shielded bag. Of course the "crackberrie addicts" would be fit for a straight jacket by the end of the flight. ;-D |
| Posted by: tipover 2010-08-31 02:00 |
| #1 Remotely Controlled Improvised Explosive Device (RCIED) roadside bomb technology appears to have now migrated, or at long last been discovered, in the airline industry. I never did fully accept the TWA Flt-800 Long Island 747 exploding fuel tank assessment. Cell phone wired to a detonator, taped to the main charge all in the baggage compartment, initiated by a call from the traveler on board or on more likely on the ground. Law Enforcement will likely be checking the call history of those phones to include specific times of potential "test" calls and call numbers received. My money would be a calls as the jet reached altitude and passed over or near Atlanta, Chicago, Dearborn, NYC, or Amsterdam, but that is just a guess. Detected "test calls" could have been the alert that led to the arrest in the NL. Knives, watches, and box cutters were most likely additional airport security screening tippers.... which, like the cellies and Pepto bottle, went undetected in Birmingham, possibly Atlanta, thence Chicago. These buggers were to probably be met by a reception team in Amsterdam if that was their final destination. If so, I hope those fellows were aprehended as well. With the anniversary of 9/11 approaching, this is not good. I'm glad they were apprehended. Now how do we stop cellies and Blackberries from coming aboard airliners? |
| Posted by: Besoeker 2010-08-31 00:52 |