Government orders airport security review after teen boards flight with shotgun

ABC NEWS (Australia)

The federal government has ordered urgent safety assessments at airports nationwide after a teenager allegedly boarded a Jetstar flight with a loaded shotgun. Authorities are now reviewing security protocols to prevent similar breaches.

Transcript

00:00This wide-ranging security review was prompted by an incident last week where

00:07extraordinary vision emerged of a citizens and staff arrest of a 17 year

00:13old boy who allegedly made it onto a passenger jet at Avalon Airport in

00:18Melbourne bound for Sydney. The busy flight saw the boy armed with a shotgun

00:23and ammunition. It was there that he was crash-tackled to the ground and held

00:27over by staff as well as a passenger on his way to attend an Aussie rules

00:32football game in Sydney over the weekend. They managed to secure him and ensure

00:37police could subsequently arrest and charge him. He's facing 12 charges before

00:42the Children's Court in Victoria and will appear at a later date after an

00:46initial appearance on Friday. Beyond this alleged incident though there are serious

00:51questions now being raised of how something like this could have happened

00:54and the acknowledgement that perhaps a tragedy was avoided. Police say the boy

00:59managed to get through a hole in the fence. It's not yet clear if that hole

01:03was already there or if he cut the hole into fence. So what will this wide-ranging

01:08review look at? Well it's going to focus on a series of airports, some of them

01:12regional, some of them in more metropolitan settings like Avalon and

01:16essentially they're classed as Tier 2. This means they're slightly smaller than

01:20major airports like Sydney Kingfin Smith or Tullamarine in Melbourne as well as

01:24Brisbane, Adelaide and Perth. But they still in some instances run

01:28international services like they do at Avalon as well as the Gold Coast which

01:33will be reviewed, the Sunshine Coast as well as larger domestic regional

01:37airports like Mackay, Rockhampton, Townsville, Newcastle, Alice Springs as

01:41well as Hobart and Launceston. Minister Tony Burke says the review will ensure

01:45that airports remain secure and that they'll monitor people who are able to

01:49come onto the grounds of airports both internally at places where security

01:53screenings are done but also at places like runways to ensure that an incident

01:57like this doesn't happen again and that passenger, crew and everyone else at

02:02airports remain safe.

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