I read the stories and watched the TV tonight and thought how pathetic the reports were.
As usual, I think Crikey came up with something pretty sharp .
A cabin decompression on Qantas flight QF670 between Adelaide and Melbourne this morning pushed the terrorist attack at Moscow’s Domodedovo Airport off the top of this morning’s radio bulletins. This is not a great reflection on news values in the Australian media.
In Moscow in an insecure part of an airport, the arrivals hall, a suicide bomber has killed at least 35 people and injured more than 150.
But the news priority locally is a 737 with 99 passengers on board that lost cabin pressure. The Qantas jet did descend steeply, as per the standard operating procedures for such an event, to 10,000 feet (just over 3000 metres) while oxygen masks dropped, and the jet landed at Tullamarine Airport 30 minutes later.
No emergency services were required. QF67 was met by reporters, not ambulances.
The real story is that at Tullamarine, and almost every other major airport in the world, the arrivals areas are unsecured, as are most places in life worldwide where people gather.
That is the overarching evil of the Domodedovo attack. It highlights the impossibility of securing places where the public freely gathers.
If airports such as those in Australia tried to seal off the arrivals halls, the target simply moves 100 metres, maybe 200, to an underground train platform or bus station, or to a car park.