REPORT OF THE - Archives - Syracuse University

identified a "lack of clearly defined procedures" for the operations staff and noted that a
single manager was providing training, supervisory and managerial functions.
Overall, the inspector found that "the system, trying adequately to control approximately
4,500 passengers and 28 flights per day, is being held together only by a very labor
intensive operation and the tenuous threads of luck." Even so, the inspector concluded, "it
appears the minimum [FAA] requirements can and are being met."
At the end of the October inspection, the FAA agent specifically pointed out to Pan Am's
Huebner the lack of a tracking system for interline bags and the confused state of the
passenger screening procedures.
Huebner was already well aware of the existence of problems like those surfaced by the
October inspection. As he would testify to the Commission, Huebner had concerns that
Alert personnel were "less well educated" and "not qualified" in all instances. Even
before the October inspection, he had concluded that the number of Alert personnel was
"inadequate" to guard Pan Am aircraft and that the passenger screening procedures were
not working properly.
On October 31, 1988, Huebner cabled the results of the October FAA inspection to
Edward Cunningham, chief of security for all of Pan Am, concluding: "I have discussed
these items in the past with [Pan Am] station management at Frankfurt. It has been
pointed out to me that for financial reasons the security staff has to be kept to a
minimum."
The FAA did not cite Pan Am for any violation as a result of the October 1988
inspection. The FAA did send Pan Am a letter October 28, requesting written evidence of
the procedures that were in place for the passenger screening system. Pan Am's response
was received at the FAA's regional office in Brussels on December 21, 1988.
The Warnings
In the period from June 1, 1988, to December 21, 1988, the FAA issued 14 security
bulletins (with three followups), nine of which, in retrospect, could have been relevant to
what became the Flight 103 tragedy. The carriers in Western Europe, and particularly in
Frankfurt, should have been alerted by the cumulative FAA bulletins to the potential for
trouble.
Two of these nine bulletins warned generally of the possibility of Iranian retaliation for
the downing of the Iranian civilian airbus over the Persian Gulf in July 1988. In the
bulletins, the FAA commented that the retaliation might take the form of an attack on
U.S. civil aviation.
Two other bulletins gave warnings about particular Middle Eastern terrorists operating
within Western Europe whose targets, the FAA commented, might include U.S. civil
aviation interests. Another of the seven bulletins contained information about suitcase
bombs in the possession of a Middle Eastern terrorist group that might be targeting
Western interests in Europe, Africa or the Middle East.
Two more bulletins passed on information about possible attempts to breach security at
Western European airports. One described incidents during the summer of 1988 at
Heathrow Airport in which an individual attempted to have other United States-bound
passengers check in bags for him. The other described more general attempts to test and
learn about security procedures at Frankfurt airport during the late November - early
December 1988 period.