Sources in CISF have confirmed that more than 10 bomb threats have been received on social media in last 24 hours….reports Asian Lite News
The Ministry of Civil Aviation has called a high-level meeting on Wednesday following 10 bomb threats received on Monday and Tuesday.
According to the sources, Minister of Civil Aviation Ram Mohan Naidu on Monday held a meeting with the Bureau of Civil Aviation, CISF, and other senior officials in airport security over the bomb threats.
Sources in CISF have confirmed that more than 10 bomb threats have been received on social media in last 24 hours.
“We have identified and suspended several accounts that were posting threats on social media regarding bombs in airplanes. It has been informed some threats were originated from London and from other countries,” said a senior police officer.
“In the last 24 hours, we have received several bomb threats in many sectors. We are taking up all the calls and also informed concerned police officers regarding the threat to identify the person behind it,” said an officer in airport security.
A senior officer in airport security said that every threat is important to them and they can ignore it as it is a matter of passengers’ safety.
“After we receive a threat, we inform airlines and the concerned security officer at the airport for further procedure,” the officer said.
Deployment of Air Marshals
With the growing number of calls claiming a threat to flights in the recent past, the central government has decided to double the number of sky marshals on flights originating from airports across the country.
A senior official from the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) confirmed that the decision to double the number of Air marshals has been taken recently after assessment of the growing threat and getting inputs from intelligence agencies.
“The fresh batch of Air Narshals will be deployed on new international routes added in sensitive category based on intelligence report. The decision was taken after several rounds of meetings will all stakeholders in aviation security,” the officer added.
A unit of the National Security Guard (NSG) specialized in anti-terror and anti-hijacking measures is deployed as Air marshals in mainly international routes and a few sensitive domestic routes.
Sky Marshals are armed plainclothes security officers who travel on passenger aircraft.
In India, Sky Marshals or flight marshals were introduced in 1999 after the hijacking of the flight Air India IC 814 in Kandahar to prevent hijacking in future. Sky marshals travel with loaded firearms/weapons in passenger (commercial) aircraft and can also take action in the aircraft to prevent hijacking.
As per reports, flights bound for Kabul in Afghanistan Kathmandu in Nepal, Colombo in Sri Lanka, certain routes in Canada and a few other routes in Middle East countries are termed sensitive routes. The number of sky marshals per flight ranges from two to six, depending upon the threat perception. (ANI)