Wednesday, December 30, 2009
THE HAGUE, Netherlands (AP) — The Netherlands announced Wednesday it will immediately begin using full body scanners for flights heading to the United States, issuing a report that called the failed Christmas Day airline bombing a “professional” al-Qaida terror attack.
A top Dutch official said a scanner of that type may have stopped Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab from boarding Northwest Airlines Flight 253 to Detroit from Amsterdam’s Schiphol Airport on Friday carrying undetected explosives. Law enforcement officials say the 23-year-old Nigerian tried but failed to detonate the explosives on a plane carrying over 300 people.