Terrorists wanted to destroy all planes, report to PM reveals

KARACHI: The initial report of the attack on the Karachi airport has been presented to Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif.

The findings of the report revealed that terrorists wanted to destroy all airplanes and paralyse entire air traffic operations but the Airport Security Force (ASF) blocked their march towards Jinnah Terminal.

Meanwhile, DG ISPR Major General Asim Bajwa tweeted that the final clearance of the entire airport had been completed. He added that the airport had been handed over to CAA/ASF and would likely open at 2:00 PM.

The prime minister’s adviser Shujaat Azeem said flight operations would resume at the Karachi airport from 4:00 PM.


Heavily armed militants launched an assault on Pakistan´s busiest airport in Karachi, leaving at least 30 dead including 10 militants in a six-hour siege that the army quelled at dawn on Monday.

Explosions and gunfire rang out as the attackers, equipped with suicide vests, grenades and rocket launchers, battled security forces in one of the most brazen attacks in years in Pakistan´s biggest city.

Authorities said all 10 militants were killed and that the bodies of 18 victims, including security personnel and four airport workers, had been identified at the Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre (JPMC).

Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) has accepted the responsibility of the attack.

More planes added to MH370 search: Australia

 

AP In this April 3, 2014 photo, ground crewmen walk across the tarmac to wait for a South Korean Navy P-3 Orion plane to return from a search operation for the missing Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370, at Royal Australian Air Force base Peace in Perth.

Search crews hunting for Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 headed back out to a remote patch of the Indian Ocean on Friday, a day after leaders of the two countries heading multinational efforts to find the missing jetliner vowed that no effort would be spared to give closure to the families of those on board.

More resources were committed to the search on Friday, with 14 planes and nine ships planning to scour a 217,000 square km expanse about 1,700 km northwest of Perth, the Joint Agency Coordination Centre overseeing the search said. Ten planes were involved in Thursday’s search.

Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott met with staff on Friday at the Australian Maritime Safety Authority, which is running the search efforts, and acknowledged officials have no idea how long the hunt would continue.

“It is probably the most difficult search that’s ever been mounted,” Mr. Abbott told staffers. “A large aircraft seems like something that would be easy enough to locate but a large aircraft that all but disappeared and disappeared into inaccessible oceans is an extraordinary, extraordinary challenge that you’re faced with.”

No trace of the jetliner has been found nearly four weeks after it vanished in the early hours of March 8 on a flight from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing with 239 people on board.

The coordination centre overseeing the search described weather in the search area on Friday as fair, with visibility about 10 km and cloud above the optimum search altitude of 1,000 feet.

On Thursday, Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak flew to Australia for briefings on the search for the Boeing 777 and to meet with Abbott, whose country is overseeing the hunt in a desolate expanse of the Indian Ocean.

Mr. Najib, whose government has been harshly criticised by families of some victims for giving sometimes conflicting information about the flight and for the slow pace of the investigation, said everyone involved in the search is thinking of the families of victims who are waiting desperately for news.

“I know that until we find the plane, many families cannot start to grieve,” Mr. Najib said. “I cannot imagine what they are going through. But I can promise them that we will not give up.

“We want to provide comfort to the families and we will not rest until answers are indeed found. In due time, we will provide a closure for this event,” he said.

But Sarah Bajc, the American girlfriend of Philip Wood, said a briefing on Thursday for Malaysian and other non-Chinese relatives by government and military officials at a hotel near Kuala Lumpur provided no new information and that some of the families had lost faith in the Malaysian government.

“They continually contradict themselves,” Ms. Bajc said on Friday of the officials. “It’s impossible to trust anything they say anymore.”

Although Australia is coordinating the ocean search, the investigation into the tragedy ultimately remains Malaysia’s responsibility. Mr. Najib said Australia had agreed to be an “accredited representative in the investigation,” and would work with Malaysia on a comprehensive agreement on the search.

Earlier this week, officials warned the investigation may never fully answer why the airliner disappeared. A dearth of information has plagued investigators from the moment the plane’s transponders, which make the plane visible to commercial radar, were shut off.

Military radar picked up the jet just under an hour later, way off course on the other side of the Malay Peninsula. Authorities say that until then, its “movements were consistent with deliberate action by someone on the plane,” but have not ruled out anything, including mechanical error.

Police are investigating the pilots and crew for any evidence suggesting they may have hijacked or sabotaged the plane. The backgrounds of the passengers have been checked by investigators and nothing suspicious has been found.

On Thursday, the British navy’s HMS Echo reported one alert as it searched for sonic transmissions from the missing plane’s flight data recorder, but it was quickly discounted as a false alarm, the search coordination centre said.

False alerts can come from animals such as whales, or interference from shipping noise.

The Ocean Shield, an Australian warship carrying a U.S. device that detects “pings” from the plane’s flight recorders, was expected to arrive by Saturday.

No confirmed trace of the plane’s wreckage has been found. Angus Houston, the head of the agency overseeing the search, has said there is no timeframe for ending the search, but acknowledged a new approach will eventually be needed if nothing turns up.

Spotting wreckage is key to narrowing the search area and ultimately finding the plane’s data recorders, which would provide a wealth of information about the condition the plane was flying under and the communications or sounds in the cockpit.

The data recorders emit a ping that can be detected by special equipment in the immediate vicinity. But the battery-powered devices stop transmitting the pings about 30 days after a crash. Locating the data recorders and wreckage after that is possible, but becomes an even more daunting task.

NATO flying surveillance planes to Ukraine border

Add captionAn AWACS plane takes off the NATO Airbase in Geilenkirchen, Germany, Wednesday, March 12, 2014. (AP)

NATO says it has dispatched two surveillance planes to fly over Poland and Romania to monitor the crisis unfolding in neighbouring Ukraine.

The military alliance says two AWAC, or Airborne Warning And Control System, reconnaissance planes took off from its bases in Geilenkirchen, Germany, and Waddington, Britain, on Wednesday morning.
A spokesman for NATO’s operational headquarters Mons, Belgium, said the flights will not leave the air space of its member nations thus not crossing either into Ukrainian or Russian airspace.

“The planes can observe over 300,000 square kilometres (115,000 square miles) and will primarily be looking on air activity and the sea,” Lt. Col. Jay Janzen said, adding that one AWACS aircraft already went on a surveillance mission to Romania on Tuesday and that more missions were being planned. “Our flights will not leave NATO airspace,” Janzen said. “Regardless, we can observe, we can look a very long way.”
Janzen said that one AWAC aircraft already went on a surveillance mission to Romania on Tuesday and that more missions were being planned. NATO’s 28 member states decided Monday to intensify the assessment of the possible threat the Ukrainian crisis poses to the alliance by sending AWACS planes. The decision comes after deployments of U.S. fighter planes to eastern European nations bordering Russia, such as Poland and Lithuania.
“The planes can observe over 300,000 square kilometers (115,000 square miles) and will primarily be looking on air activity and the sea,” Lt. Col. Jay Janzen said, adding that one AWACS aircraft already went on a surveillance mission to Romania on Tuesday and that more missions were being planned. “Our flights will not leave NATO airspace,” Janzen said. “Regardless, we can observe, we can look a very long way.”
Janzen said the flights had already been planned as training missions before NATO’s decision, but more planes will be added to the exercises in the coming days. The plane flying out of the German base to Romania was an E-3A AWACS and the plane leaving Britain for Poland was an E-3B AWACS, Janzen said.

Qantas planes clip wings in Los Angeles

SYDNEY: Two Qantas planes collided while being towed out of a hanger in Los Angeles, the struggling carrier said Saturday, with the damage substantial enough to cause the cancellation of flights.
The incident occurred on Thursday evening US time, the same day the airline announced it would slash 5,000 jobs after posting a Aus$235 million (US$210 million) loss in the six months to December 31.
"The wing tips of two Qantas aircraft, an A380 and B747, came into contact at approximately 9pm (local) while being towed out of the hangar in Los Angeles. No passengers were on board," Qantas said.
Australian media reports said the planes suffered "millions of dollars" worth of damage, although this could not be confirmed.
It forced the cancellation of a flight to Melbourne and another to Brisbane, with a full investigation underway.
The incident capped a woeful week for Qantas, which is working to to save Aus$2 billion over the next three years as it battles record fuel costs and fierce competition from subsidised rivals.