9-11-type al-Qaida Plot Prompted Groundings  

White House, nuclear power plants topped target list of hijacked planes

January 4, 2004
By Joseph Farah
© 2004 WorldNetDaily.com

WASHINGTON – The discovery of a Sept. 11-style al-Qaida plot to hijack several planes simultaneously and crash them into U.S. targets is behind the recent rash of airline groundings and increased security during the holidays, WorldNetDaily has learned from U.S. intelligence sources.

Other potential targets included the Valdez oil terminal in Alaska, closed last week as a precautionary measure, and New York and Los Angeles tourist sites. British Airways, Air France and Mexico's national carrier, AeroMexico, were the airlines to be used by the terrorists, according to the plan discovered a week before Christmas.

Some of the terrorists were planning to use shoe bombs, according to WND sources. Briton Richard Reid in December 2001 tried to ignite an explosive device hidden in his shoe during a flight from Paris to Miami. He was overpowered and later jailed for life.

The hijackers were planning to use legitimate UK, U.S. or other European passports in an attempt to evade stringent security checks. There was also a sub-plot in which a terrorist infiltrated the ranks of airline pilots.

Nearly a dozen international flights to the U.S. were canceled during the New Year holiday weekend. The Bush administration has ordered sky marshals be placed on all airlines.

The plot involved specifically British Airways Flight 223 from Heathrow to Washington. Several of those flights over a three-day period were grounded or shadowed by U.S. F-16 fighter jets. British Airways also grounded two flights to Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, due to fly on New Year's Eve and Saturday afternoon. Yesterday's British Airways Flight 223 to Washington was allowed to leave following a three-hour delay for security checks. It landed without incident at Dulles International Airport near Washington.

British officials today warned that travelers face years of severe security alerts like one that forced several international flights to be grounded last week. Transport Secretary Alistair Darling said exceptional circumstances and specific information about a possible terror threat led British Airways to cancel its flights last week.

"For many years to come, we are going to be living in an age where there is going to be a heightened state of alert," he told the BBC. "Sometimes it will be quite severe."

Britain's Sunday Times newspaper, citing a senior British intelligence source, said security services were looking for two al-Qaida members at large in Britain who planned to detonate shoe bombs or similar devices in an aircraft lavatory.

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