Belgium: Security checks failed to detect explosives in Charleroi airport luggage


According to several sources inside the airport, two security checks were organised in February. In both cases, the aim was to check whether the officers were able to detect explosive powder hidden in checked luggage.

During the first so-called “covert” check, fake explosive powders were introduced without announcing it to the airport’s security company. Out of a dozen sachets of fake explosive powder, more than half were not detected. Regarding the second control, it was “announced” with the presence of agents of the Directorate-General for Air Transport (DGTA) at the federal level and the European Commission. In this case, officers detected just over half of the dummy explosive powders placed.

Read more…
Source: RTBF News


Sign up for Counter-IED Report Newsletter


Related:

  • Explosives found in Brussels, no sign Tour de France targeted: prosecutors

    July 8, 2019

    Belgian police are investigating the discovery of home-made explosives, knives and brass knuckles, but nothing immediately points to an attack plot, including against the Tour de France, prosecutors said Monday. A worker found the arms on Saturday evening hidden by a stairway of a building in Anderlecht, a neighbourhood of the capital Brussels through which the ...

  • Brussels Airport failed to spot bomb belt security test

    February 28, 2019

    “On 1 October last year, I was asked to try to pass the security checkpoint with a fake bomb belt”, said the mystery passenger, HLN reports. “The belt looked very credible, with wires, a detonator and a substance that had the same density as real explosives,” added the passenger. When being searched, the passenger pretended to be a ...

  • Belgium explosion: Man ‘blows himself up’ on football pitch in Stembert, Verviers

    July 31, 2018

    It is believed that this is an isolated act and authorities have been to the victim’s home to ensure there are no other explosives there. The victim has not been formally identified but Le Soir newspaper is reporting it was a former soldier who lived close by. Panorama Steet and adjacent streets have been evacuated and residents ...

  • Brussels police shoot at car ‘full of explosives’

    August 8, 2017

    Police in Brussels have opened fire on a car believed to be filled with explosives. Shots were fired after a high-speed chase through the suburb of Molenbeek. The vehicle then reportedly got stuck in traffic, at which point it reversed into a police car. Belgian broadcaster RTL quoted a police spokesman as saying: “We got the driver out, ...

  • Paris attacks: isis suicide squad ‘kept weapons arsenal in belgian kindergarten’

    July 14, 2017

    The Islamic State militant group (ISIS) network behind the suicide bomb assaults in Paris and Brussels likely hid their weapons on the premises of a kindergarten in Belgium, according to a handwritten map drawn by Salah Abdeslam, the last living member of the terrorist cell behind the Paris attacks on November 13, 2015. The ISIS-affiliated network ...