Swiss flight "robbed" on the apron in Brussels
 

How on earth could this happen (if true)??

Armed Robbery On LX789 @ BRU Airport — Civil Aviation Forum | Airliners.net

"Tonight arround 20h00 (8PM) a group of armed robbers (some sources say 8 armed with automatic weapons, driving in 2 vehicles) attacked flight LX789 (Fokker F100) of Swiss, the evening flight to ZRH and robbed the plane which was just loaded with a valuable cargo by Brinks. The cargo is rumoured to be a significant amount of diamonds, no value yet available. The diamonds where scheduled to fly to Zurich."

Was waiting for that to happen...Almost always when flying to
BRU we would have valuable cargo...we sometimes were making our own plans on the flight deck:E

Now just imagine they were 8 determined suicide bombers! What it spells out is that what masquarades as security at airports is just one big con. But we knew that anyway.

Life imitates art
 

Hollywood has already done this one, check out "Heist", which involved a shipment of gold headed to Switzerland!
Great cast, Gene Hackman, Danny DiVito, written by David Mamet.
A very good flick with some attention to detail, a trade mark of Mamet.
No special effects or CGI but enough twists to leave your head spinning.
This one is not over till it is over.

A similar situation happened on a Swissair flight I was working on as a flight attendant in 1995 or 1996 (can't remember). Also in BRU on a late evening flight back to ZRH. It was on a MD80. During the turn to line up on the runway. A pax suddenly stood and shouted that there was a car and some masked men at the back of the plane. A colleague f/a ran to the cockpit. The first officer opened his window and looked back,...saw what was happening. We then rolled all the way down the runway at relatively high speed and ordered to park in a remote area of the airport. The aft cargo door was open. We then spent some time with pax and police in the terminal. Flight was cancelled and I remember the long, generous drink(s) the whole crew had back at the hotel.

As inconvenient and invasive as airport security is to passengers, crew and ground support personnel, it doesn't seem to be much of a problem for motivated and reasonably competent criminals. But then that's true everywhere. While it is possible to have a very high level of physical security just about anywhere, very few people really want to live like that and so tend not to be supportive of the measures necessary to achieve it.

Unfortunately it's true, one of the cars was found burned in a town near Brussels.

A source says the stolen load includes 10 kilograms or diamonds, some sources say they also got some gold.

At 11h00 CET there will be a press briefing by the justice department.


Actually, I'm not surprised they got through the fence, this is quite easy to do at nearly every airport but what I don't understand is that they were able to breach the fence (which is protected by camera's and maybe even motion detection) and use the same hole again to escape. Most of they time when you drive past the airport fence you'll have a 90% chance to pass one or multiple police vehicles, yet they managed to breach the fence, drive over the tarmac, rob the plane, load everything in the vehicles and drive away via the same way they came in. I would have expected to have police at the fence in minutes after the breach was detected. But apparently they didn't got there in time even though it's being said the robbery took about 10 minutes which is quite sufficient to react upto.

Oh well, our police hadn't the best of reputations (except in some specialised fields), I guess they proved it again today...

I just hope they were all wearing their high-viz jackets or there really will be trouble.

Swiss flight "robbed" on the apron in Brussels
 

Smells obviously of an inside job... But it is indeed strange that they could get in and out of the airport perimeter without being bothered.

Read Richard Feynman's account of driving into the most secure place on Earth - and then driving out via a downed fence, only to come in again, and again and again. It was then they told him not to be so silly.

The place was Los Alamos, the secrecy, the Manhattan project.


I used to take money to Bern. New money by the Dak load. I once drove my car over a similar downed fence and parked at LGW for the day. When we got to the (preloaded) aircraft, there was an old guy asleep in a van near the rear door. When we got to Burn, we were met with tanks and a lot of soldiers.

As it happens, I had a snooze on the money on the way down.

The Stopwatch Gang was implicated in the 1974 robbery of gold bars from the Ottawa airport.

A member was also suspected in the 1990 Dorval robbery from a taxiing aircraft under charter by Brinks. The perimeter fence was crashed by a garbage truck and followed by two vans. Shortly before a diversionary pipe bomb had gone off some distance away.

Airplane Thieves Flee With $13.7 Million in Gold, Valuables

Good one:E:ok:

According to the latest info the robbers weren't able to fetch to whole load of diamonds, the left part of it but the value of the stolen diamonds is said to be 50 million EUR. However, English language media, including Reuters are writing the load had an estimated value of 350 million EUR. The worst part is that it were uncut, rough diamonds which makes them virtually untraceable and easy to sell. The whole heist at the plane didn't last longer then 3 minutes. Later one of the used cars (a Mercedes Vito) was found burning. They used blue lights on the cars to be able to make a quick getaway. The diamonds were loaded at Antwerp and where transported by Brink's specialised diamond division Brink's Diamond & Jewellery Services.

Unfortunately this isn't the first time a robbery took place at Brussels Airport, in 2005, 2001, 2000, 1995 and 1982 similar actions happened where either diamonds, gold or other valuable good were stolen. This robbery however seems to be the most valuable of all.

There was a similar robbery around (if I remember) 96-98. If memory serves me well they entered that time via the gate at the Cargo end of the apron.

Also happened at Luxembourg airport in 2000; shots fired, people injured, access/egress via fence. I was working there a few years ago when a similar high-value flight arrived; SWAT team, armoured personnel carriers, roof-top snipers, dogs, the lot.

Nothing that happens in Belgium surprises me - I worked at LGG for a year..................

All pilots and pax must pass the airport security check.

Is it time to include all the robbers as well? :}

Can't see this being reported anywhere on the news feeds?!?

Robbed stuff said to be 10 kg of diamonds worth 350 Million Euros.

Swiss flight "robbed" on the apron in Brussels
 

If true it will certainly be a contender for the heist of the century ...

Swsissair DC9 robbed at Rome in 1981 - when intercepted along the taxiway called company and ground frequencies which suddenly went quiet.
first officer descended to close aft freight door. Cargo found missing in Zrh.

GBP300 million!

Armed Robbers In £300m Belgium Diamond Heist

Multi-Million Diamond Heist at Brussels Airport - ABC News
Armed robbers in $467 million diamond heist at Brussels airport - World News
BRUSSELS: 8 armed men in diamond heist at Brussels airport - World Wires - MiamiHerald.com
Robbers steal diamonds worth '£300m' in daring raid on Brussels airport - Europe - World - The Independent
Armed gang in airport diamonds raid - Independent.ie
Giant diamond heist at Brussels airport: prosecutors | My Sinchew
Cookies must be enabled. | The Australian

etc...

I think they made an error somewhere. The load was presumably 10 kilograms (22 lbs) of diamonds which equals about 50.000 carats. Now if it was cut diamonds then this should indeed be worth about 350 million EUR, however they were uncut, rough diamonds and thus far more less valuable then cut diamonds. However, since they are uncut, rough diamonds they are virtually untraceable and thus easy to sell.

At this point it is said that the value of the heist is estimated at 50 million (some say USD, others say EUR) which is still a very significant amount of money...

Yeah, but look: The guys who broke in weren't carrying any yoghurts or liquids that were more than 100ml, so what's the problem?

Does it count as lost baggage ??
If so the airline liability for the loss will be minimal under the various
Conventions & Protocols the Airlines conveniently negotiate for their fee paying passengers

Baggage is something a person checks in, this was high value cargo loaded on a scheduled flight.

The press conference didn't bring much new things to light:

- 2 cars drove onto the tarmac through the fence (cars were equiped with blue lights)
- 4 armed robbers per car
- Armed robbers where wearing uniforms similar to police uniforms
- Security personnel, pilot, co-pilot, red cap held at gun point during robbery
- 120 packages full of diamonds were taken
- Estimated value yet unknown
- 1 of the cars was found burning moments later
- Big police alert issued after the robbery, investigation ongoing

LGW - BBC now on the case!

BBC News - 'Gigantic' Brussels Airport diamond heist

Probably used a random number generator for the amount of dosh ;)

And surely insured as such (high value cargo, that is!), though after such a big security fiasco insurance premiums are definitely going to skyrocket! :}

wow 10 kg of diamonds thats a lot of grey boxes .use to do a flight a manchester once every 3 months that use to have 3kg of dimonds and 500kg gold bars . amazing how heavey a little wooden box with 10 gold bars in it is and a pain in the arse to move


:ok:

Know of an airport that once listed a shipment of Intel processors as "Short Shipped" even though arrived just over a ton, christ knows how much that would be worth.

Also the famous story of a certain airline's staff room being held open with a dusty gold ingot as a doorstop.

This story nicely illustrates the true value of aviation 'security'.


Embuggerence value? Huge.

Security value? Negligable.

Deterrence value to determined people? Less than zero.

If I recall correctly this actually happened before in BRU years ago. It was either diamonds or gold that was being transported across the airport. It departed one side of the airport but never arrived on the other end. Far as I know this was never solved.

It happened quite a few time in BRU, in 1982, 1995, 1999, 2000, 2001 and 2005. Either diamonds, gold or other valuables where stolen then. The biggest heist in Belgium however happened off airport in the diamont center of Antwerp where 100 million EUR (official number, unofficially much higher) mostly in diamonds were stolen in 2003.

It was reported that this heist had a value of 50 million EUR but apparently they came back to this number and are now saying that they don't know the value of the heist. Thus it can be much lower but also much higher. The official version is that 120 packages of diamonds were stolen during the heist.

Huh!!! Teenage scribblers at work?
 

Spelling police having a sleep at the Sky website.....

"cut a whole in a perimeter fence"

No way this wasn't an inside job! Who else would have access to the manifest?

This type of heist is always an inside job. Who would go to the trouble of putting together an armed commando and taking a huge risk (or maybe not, as no shots at all were actually fired from the other side :}) by forcefully penetrating a secure area, only to most likely find the hold filled with common, worthless luggage? Lots of people employed in security firms who would gladly sell out for just a (relatively) small chunk out of a 50million+ loot.

The value is probably based on estimated potential maximum, a good game to allow journalists unlimited scope for guesswork and speculation.

There was a similar heist at JNB in 2006, from an SAA aircraft about to depart for London.

Antwerp and Amsterdam
 

What I am curious about is who will buy the uncut diamonds and where will they be cut?

The above places close by but the trade is tightly controlled by DeBeers/oppenheimers and other notable folks. Antwerp has its fair share of crooks and the Jewish community has its black sheep as do the rest of us but would have thought it too obvious.

Are the stones off to India or somewhere similar where there are decent cutters and a big market for sparkly glass?

Back in the 1990s was FO on a BA 75 that flew half a tonne of gold from Toronto to JFK the armoured car which delivered it also followed us out towards the runway...

Tel Aviv, New York also diamond cutting centres.