Mint Quick Edit | Explosive handsets: Should airlines worry?
Subscribe to enjoy similar stories. The Dubai-based air carrier Emirates has banned pagers and walkie-talkies from its flights after a bunch of these exploded recently in the hands of Hezbollah militants, leaving at least 40 dead and thousands injured.
Since explosions of each type of device were simultaneous and remotely triggered, one may assume there are none left that might still blow up. The airline, however, is taking no chances.
Unfortunately, there’s no foolproof way of identifying rigged devices, given the intermeshed nature of global supply chains where different components are made in various parts of the world and come together in another part. The pagers that blew up said “Made in Taiwan" but were reportedly made by a Hungary-based firm that later claimed it only marketed them.
At what stage plastic explosives were inserted remains a mystery. The incident reveals the dangers of manufacturing networks that sprawl the globe, leaving chinks to be exploited in the security armour.
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