Heightened State Of Awareness For Bizjets

Draconian security measures on airliners and the corresponding upswing in the use of (and interest in) private air transportation has led to perhaps inevitable scrutiny of the security and safety of business aircraft. The first cautionary remarks (that we've heard, anyway) come from Martin Rudner, the director of the Canadian Center of Intelligence and Security Studies at Carleton University in Ottawa. "One wants to make sure, for example, that terrorists groups, who usually aren't short of money, don't travel internationally avoiding aviation security and border controls by chartering aircraft," he told the Ottawa Citizen, acknowledging that millions of people avoid that particular brand of scrutiny every day by traveling by car, bus, ship, train and foot. "Any chinks of the armor are going be exploited by a terrorist determined to cause casualties and harm and that's why we have to protect all the chinks in the armor." If he had insights into how that might be accomplished, The Citizen didn't pass them along. A Transport Canada official told the newspaper that while it's true that bizjet passengers can take suntan lotion with them, the government department is constantly monitoring the source of security threats and is ready to take "immediate action" if it detects a risk of trouble from any type of operation.