To test the capacity of handling aviation security emergencies on a periodical basis, the government bodies and the aviation operators involved in airport security jointly conducted a security exercise on “bomb threat” in Macau International Airport in late evening yesterday till early this morning to simulate the activation of the Airport Emergency Plan and the security contingency procedures in response to receiving a phone call on bomb threat and the finding of a genuine bomb in the cargo terminal.
The exercise took place from 23:00 on 10 September to 01:00 early this morning. The scenario was of an anonymous phone call made to the Macao Customs Services from an association who claimed that they had delivered a bomb cargo and demanded for the release of some prisoners or else they would detonate the bomb on a plane. With the assessment made by the bomb threat analysis and evaluation group, the airport declared emergency and activated the airport emergency plan to handle the crisis. The representatives from all relevant entities arrived at the emergency operations centre with no delay. The Public Security Police Force acted as the commander of the crisis group and coordinated with all parties on the action plan which included cordoning off the cargo terminal where the suspect bomb was located, evacuating the people in the area and conducting a comprehensive inspection. The public security police found a suspect in the flyover of the airport and arrested him who was later determined by the judiciary police to be the culprit. The special police confirmed that the suspect bomb in the cargo terminal was genuine and removed it to the protection area in the airport to detonate it. About 120 participants took part in the exercise which was deemed smooth.
Coordinated by Public Security Police Force, the exercise involved the participation of Unitary Police Force, Macao Customs Services, Judiciary Police, Fire Services Bureau, Health Bureau, Marine and Water Bureau, Civil Aviation Authority, CAM-Macau International Airport Company Ltd, Macau Security Company Ltd. (airport security), Menzies Macau Airport Services Ltd, Air Macau Company Ltd. and so on.
