MAS Aircraft Packages Spark Security Alert At Perth Airport

MELBOURNE, May 4 (Bernama) -- Several suspicious cardboxes found on a Malaysia Airlines (MAS) aircraft when it landed at the Perth International Airport Saturday night forced the evacuation of thousands of passengers and staff.

The terminal was shut down for almost 12 hours from 6pm Saturday after baggage handlers noticed the packages on the incoming MAS flight MH125 from Kuala Lumpur, the Australian Associated Press (AAP) reported.

The packages, believe to contain artificial flowers, were eventually x-rayed by the bomb squad and found to contain nothing dangerous, but not before eight international flights were either cancelled, diverted or delayed.

Perth Airport chief executive Brad Geatches told AAP it took about 20 minutes to evacuate about 3,000 passengers and staff to an exclusion zone 2km from the airport buildings.

Police also had to hold back thousands more people arriving at the airport to board flights or collect friends and loved ones.

Assistant commissioner of counter-terrorism and state protection John McRoberts said today it was one of the biggest security operations at Perth Airport involving about 100 officers.

"It's certainly the most significant event I know at the Perth Airport," he was quoted by AAP as saying.

"It was a major operation, it was an operation that caused ... considerable inconvenience to the travelling public, to the staff at the airport, to government agencies that responded, and that's regrettable.

"But I think people ought to take some comfort in the fact that the safety of everybody was of paramount concern to us," he said.

McRoberts would not explain what alerted police to the unaccompanied freight, but said they were part of a consignment destined for someone in Perth. That person was spoken to by police last night and the story checked out with what police found when the boxes were x-rayed at a safe site on the airport grounds.

Police refused to say what was in the packages, fearing copycat events.

The airport was evacuated one hour after the packages were identified, but due to unexplained delays in the operations, it took another nine hours before they were x-rayed.

Perth International Airport was reopened at 5.30am local time, with possible delays expected over the next two days.

Meanwhile in KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia Airlines Cargo Sdn Bhd (MASkargo) in a statement Sunday said the cargo consignment on flight MH125/3 May 2008 to Perth had fully undergone all stringent regulatory and safety requirements of IATA, US Customs, US Transportation Security Administration (TSA), Malaysian Department of Civil Aviation (DCA) and other relevant authorities.

The shipment was thoroughly examined and put through the x-ray screening machine, where no suspicious contents were detected, and placed in the secure part of the warehouse for 24 hours before it was flown to Perth.

"We do not take safety and security lightly at MASkargo. Our standard of operations clearly emphasises strict adherence to rules and regulations imposed by all relevant authorities and we observe these requirements without fail at all times," MASkargo managing director Shahari Sulaiman said in the statement.

-- BERNAMA