Report: Plot to Attack U.S. With BA Jets

January 5, 2004

The al Qaeda terrorist group plans to simultaneously hijack several airliners, including a British Airways jet, and crash them into the U.S. Capitol and several nuclear plants on the East Coast, a senior intelligence source told the London Times.

According to the paper, while there has been no official overseas or domestic acknowledgement of the plan, a senior intelligence source says that's why several international flights into the U.S. have been delayed over the past week or so.

In addition to British Airways, the source told the Times al Qaeda planned to hijack Air France and AeroMexico planes as well.

The source told the paper New York and Los Angeles were targets, as well as Washington, D.C. and an oil terminal in Alaska.

The oil terminal target is thought to be the Alaskan port of Valdez, the terminal for an 800-mile pipeline which carries 17 percent of the U.S. domestic oil supply, said the paper.

British Airways flight BA 223, a flight which has been canceled or delayed several times this week, is reportedly one of the flights involved in the plot.

In recent days, 10 inbound overseas flights were grounded: two BA flights to Washington, two AeroMexico flights from Mexico City to LA and six Air France flights from Paris to LA.

Also, three other flights were escorted into American airports by U.S. fighter jets and one Mexican passenger plane was turned back in mid-flight.

The hijacking plots contributed heavily to Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge's decision in December to raise the nation's terror alert to orange, or "high."  

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