By JANE ARMSTRONG
From Wednesday's Globe and Mail
A U.S. Navy aircraft packed with people pretending to be hijacked landed at Vancouver International Airport Tuesday in a drill designed to test the ability of the U.S. and Canada to respond to a crisis.
Vancouver — The C-9 aircraft, the military version of the McDonnell Douglas DC-9, took off from Whidbey Island Naval Air Station at Oak Harbour, Wash., Tuesday morning. Less than an hour later, two U.S. fighter jets were streaming over Vancouver.
The C-9 was one of two planes involved in the mock hijackings.
Another, a Delta Air Lines Boeing 757, flew from Salt Lake City to Elmendorf Air Force Base in Anchorage, Alaska. Each plane was simulating a hijacking of a commercial airliner and each was packed with police and military personnel pretending to be civilians. The training exercise was planned before the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the United States in which hijacked commercial airliners plowed into the World Trade Centre, the Pentagon and a field outside Pittsburgh.
About 1,500 personnel were involved in the exercise, which included 200 to 300 Mounties, said RCMP Sergeant Grant Learned.
In the drill, fighter jets — first in the United States, then in Canada — responded to the emergency and were instructed to run through several exercises, including firing on the planes.
"We use a graduated response, which begins with simply intercepting and identifying the aircraft, and could include the use of lethal force and shooting down the aircraft," said Major Mike Snyder of the North American Aerospace Defence Command.
By Tuesday afternoon, each plane had landed safely in Vancouver and Anchorage. The ground exercises, involving mainly police personnel, extended into the evening. Also participating in the drill were U.S. officials from the Transportation Security Administration, the Federal Emergency Management Agency, Delta Airlines and the Federal Aviation Administration.
Major Snyder said the simulation was designed to see how fast the North American Aerospace Defence command could respond to a hijacking report.
"Time is of the essence, especially when it comes to NORAD," Major Snyder said from NORAD headquarters in Colorado Springs, Colo. "Generally, we're only as good as the intelligence and the warning that we receive."
Fighter planes were launched on Sept. 11, 2001, in an attempt to intercept the terrorist-hijacked airliners, but none reached their targets in time, he noted.
"How quickly will NORAD respond? That's what being tested, really."
Tuesday afternoon, the U.S. Navy aircraft sat parked on a tarmac at Vancouver Airport, surrounded by at least seven tactical-police vehicles. Nearby, a sniper crouched on a moveable staircase. At one point, an aircraft door opened and someone waved.
There was no live fire, Major Snyder said, and at no time was there danger to civilians.
Since the terrorist attacks, NORAD has flown 22,000 sorties to watch the skies for hijackers and other threats, and fighter jets have responded to more than 300 incidents of planes raising suspicions — in many cases because the aircraft were off course or did not identify themselves.
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