This article from NYTimes.com has been sent to you by psa188@juno.com. /-------------------- advertisement -----------------------\ Share the spirit with a gift from Starbucks. Our coffee brewers & espresso machines at special holiday prices. http://www.starbucks.com/shop/subcategory.asp?category_name=Sale/Clearance&ci=274&cookie_test=1 \----------------------------------------------------------/ Focus Turns to the Threat of Food Carts as Weapons January 5, 2002 By MICHELINE MAYNARD With everything including tennis shoes and plastic cutlery looming as potential safety risks in the skies, travelers, aviation and federal officials are expressing concern that another mundane device - the cart for food and beverage service - could be turned into a weapon. The carts are under scrutiny both for the danger they have already posed to flight attendants in the hands of unruly passengers and as potential hiding places for explosives. As soon as passenger jets returned to the skies in mid-September, the Federal Aviation Administration instituted new security measures governing the service carts. Although an F.A.A. spokesman declined to detail those steps, airport officials said they included stepped-up random inspections by agency personnel at catering operations that prepare meals and stock the carts for delivery to planes. Industry groups, safety advocates and some security officials say that even more needs to be done, particularly after the Dec. 22 shoe-bomb incident on a Paris-to-Miami flight. Then, a quick-witted flight attendant stopped Richard C. Reid from setting off his explosive-laden shoes. Experts note that a cart might have blocked the attendant's path to Mr. Reid, or that he could have used one to harm her, as unruly passengers have done. The Association of Flight Attendants, which represents 50,000 employees at 26 airlines, says the carts, which can weigh more than 200 pounds, are a leading cause of injuries to its members. "They've been used against flight attendants," said Jeff Zack, a union spokesman, calling the carts "unwieldy and dangerous." The union has not taken a stand on banning the carts. The Business Travel Coalition, in a survey of its members in late November, found that 60 percent of those who identified themselves as travel agents or corporate travel planners supported elimination of beverage carts, at least on short flights without food service. Only 40 percent of the hotel and restaurant executives and the government officials responding to the survey supported a ban. Many said that flight attendants could not provide adequate service without the carts and that passengers would not tolerate cuts, the coalition's president, Kevin C. Mitchell, said. Two airlines with schedules that are heavy with short flights, Southwest Airlines and JetBlue Airways, do not use carts, instead serving from galleys using plastic trays. Domestic and international airlines forgo carts in business and first class, taking food and drinks directly from the galley to passengers' seats. William Shumann, an F.A.A. spokesman, said the agency was not considering banning service carts. But industry officials said that several of the safety measures the aviation agency imposed after Sept. 11 focused on food service. Airline officials have also increased inspections of catering centers, said Bill Slay, a spokesman for LSG Sky Chefs International, a unit of Lufthansa, the German airline. Sky Chefs is one of the world's biggest airline caterers. Sky Chefs, which has 16,000 employees in its catering sites at 126 United States airports, employs an outside security company that inspects and then seals each cart before it is placed on a catering truck and delivered to a plane, where a cabin attendant accepts delivery. The carts remain sealed until service begins. Still, Sky Chefs' procedures are not as stringent as those at El Al, the Israeli airline considered the gold standard for aviation security. At its catering center, several miles from Tel Aviv's airport, security guards monitor every step of food packaging, from items being ladled onto trays and sealed with plastic wrap, said Isaac Zeffet, a former chief of El Al security who now runs a consulting concern in Cliffside Park, N.J. Under the new federal aviation security law, all workers who come in contact with passenger jets will have to undergo criminal background checks, a requirement that the F.A.A. plans to phase in over the next few years. Mr. Slay said Sky Chefs already required such checks for truck drivers and delivery workers who take carts to airplanes. But the checks are not required for chefs and workers preparing food and others in the kitchens at the catering operations. Federal agents found Sky Chefs identification badges at the Detroit home of Ahmed Hannan, 33, and Karim Koubriti, 23, who were arrested a week after the Sept. 11 attacks. The men, who were indicted on charges of document fraud, were dishwashers for Sky Chefs at Detroit Metropolitan Airport last summer. Mr. Slay said the expired badges would not have let the men near a plane. But the incident is among the reasons the National Air Disaster Alliance, a nonprofit organization representing family members of plane crash victims, is urging background checks of all airport personnel. Mr. Zeffet, the former El Al security chief, said banning carts would be only a patch on a security system that requires a complete overhaul, including tighter controls on everyone and everything that comes in contact with planes before takeoff. "What we have is a bad security system on the ground," he said. http://www.nytimes.com/2002/01/05/national/05CART.html?ex=1011281479&ei=1&en=917063bc213bb8c2 HOW TO ADVERTISE --------------------------------- For information on advertising in e-mail newsletters or other creative advertising opportunities with The New York Times on the Web, please contact Alyson Racer at alyson@nytimes.com or visit our online media kit at http://www.nytimes.com/adinfo For general information about NYTimes.com, write to help@nytimes.com. Copyright 2001 The New York Times Company