January 02, 2005

During the past week, there've been half-a-dozen sightings of laser beams in cockpits of planes landing all over the country.
Poster Phantom over at Sgt. Stryker's give us his theory as to what's happening and it involves the usual suspects, i.e. the Islamist terrorists:
Airline Laser Threat

[...]
Lasers are not being used to blind pilots. Lasers are being used to measure straight line distance from the ground to an aircraft aircraft at its most vulnerable state - landing. An aircraft on takeoff would be a more difficult target - maximum power and maximum climb. But a landing ship slows down to a speed just short of a stall and follows a prescribed path of flight .

The information regarding an aircraft’s peak vulnerability would be invaluable. Documenting landing approaches and and straight line distances would be highly useful in target acquisition. That information is critical regarding available weapons systems.

Since 2002, the FBI has been issuing warnings about shoulder fired missiles being smuggled into the U.S. The effective range of older shoulder fired missiles is between 11,000 and 15,000 feet and can be fired from up to 3 miles away from the target. Newer models, which are already bring copied by the likes of North Korea, China and Pakistan have ranges exceeding 22,000 feet with greater stand off distances.

In September of 2003, the Department of Homeland Security began soliciting bids for anti-missile devices for commercial aircraft. That was the beginning of an 18 to 24 month screening process.

In late December of 2004, it was revealed that Los Angeles Airport (LAX) was increasing its preparedness for a shoulder fired missile attack. John Miller, head of the LAPD Counterterrorism Bureau, explained that about 20,000 shoulder-fired missiles were currently on the black market. The black market prices range from $5,000 to $30,000, presumably based on the vintage of the weapon.
[...]

Our enemies know full well the impact another threat to aviation security would have on this Country. They are trying to crash airships and cripple our transportation industry before we can equip commercial aircraft with effective countermeasures. It is telling that the LAPD is moving to protect LAX against a missile threat against increasing incidents of lasers targeting commercial aircraft.

We know the bad guys did this in Iraq--Remember the DSL plane they shot down in late 2003, right before President Bush went to Baghdad for Thanksgiving?
And here at home, I've never believed that TWA 800 was brought down because there was a leak in the gas tank.
As to why American #587 fell out of the sky onto Rockaway Queens killing all aboard just 2 months after the 9/11 attacks, well, supposedly it's tail, wings and engines just fell off...Uh-huh.
We can only hope that DHS gets those anti-missile systems on our planes ASAP.
Meanwhile, they're having a nice long talk in an interrogation room to one man they caught using a laser in New Jersey:
Person Questioned About Laser Beam, Planes

[...]
Federal agents are looking into several recent incidents involving lasers and aircraft, including cases in Cleveland, Washington, Houston, Colorado Springs, Colo., and Medford, Ore. In some cases the lasers locked onto aircraft several thousand feet up as they approached airports for landing.

What else could it be but target acquisition?
And as clumsy as our airport security measures may be (in that Mineta won't let us profile for Arab Muslim male terrorists), it appears that we've made it very difficult for the Enemy to hijack or otherwise commandeer our planes after boarding, so they're having to try another way.
(Come to think of it, Trenton, N.J. isn't that far from Rockaway Queens, is it?)