Terrorists Target Planes With ‘Human Bombs’ Sewn Inside Jihadists
British airports have been placed on heightened security amid revelations that Al Qaeda’s top bomb maker has developed a “human bomb” that can evade scanners by being surgically placed within a human body.
Ibrahim Hassan al-Asiri, a 32-year-old explosive expert referred to as Al Qaeda’s “evil genius,” is believed to be behind a sinister plot to target transatlantic flights with the human bombs, which utilize chemicals that airport scanners don’t recognize. The bombs can be hidden in devices such as laptops, or implanted in the body of a suicide bomber, rendering them nearly undetectable.
“Think of it as a way to confuse the technology in scanners,” security expert Will Geddes told MailOnline, adding, “It could be the substances in a printer cartridge.” Bomb making technology has evolved over the last ten years, Geddes said, pointing out that “security experts are worried that there has been more bomb training in some of the terror cells across the Arabian peninsula.”
The human bomb technology is believed to have already made its way into the hands of British jihadists in Syria and Iraq. Airport security is being tightened due to fears that those militants will return to the U.K. in an attempt to use the bombs against a flight to the U.S.
U.S. authorities ordered airports en route to American cities to step up security after receiving a threat they call “credible,” The Mirror reports. Secretary Jeh Johnson of the Department of Homeland Security said that extra security measures aimed at stopping human bombs would be “both seen and unseen.”
CIA agents reportedly uncovered the threat, discovering that terrorists can fashion some bombs with a small amount of liquid explosives and a detonator that is non-metallic. Once surgically implanted in a human bomber or placed in a laptop, the explosives would then likely pass current security measures. In April of this year, al-Asiri survived a special forces ambush, when a vehicle thought to be transporting the terrorist was targeted by a drone strike and ground assault.
Al-Asiri is the mastermind of several other high profile terrorist attacks, as The Inquisitr has previously reported. Chillingly, one of those incidents involved one of al-Asiri’s bombs being used by his willing younger brother in a suicide bomb attempt to assassinate Saudi Prince Muhammed Bin Nayef, which failed. Al-Asiri was also behind the underwear bomb that was meant to down an airliner, but did not detonate, on Christmas Day in 2009.
Authorities have asked travelers to be patient with increased security measures at airports following the revelation of the terrorists’ human bomb plot.
[Images via Newsweek and MailOnline]
