British Airports Reportedly Have New Luggage Orders

New security orders have been issued to all of Britain’s major airports, a Manchester airport spokesman said Saturday. The orders came amid controversy over warnings received before the December bombing of Pan Am Flight 103.

The British news media said it is believed the new directive requires passengers to remove all electric and electronic equipment from luggage before check-in and to pack such items in hand luggage to be examined at boarding gates.

Investigators have said the bomb that blew up Flight 103 on Dec. 21 over Lockerbie, Scotland, killing all 259 people on the plane and 11 on the ground, was concealed in a radio-cassette player.

A Manchester airport spokesman, speaking anonymously in keeping with British practice, said the orders were received Friday night, but he could not give details because it was a security matter.

The Department of Transport would not say if a new directive had been sent. But it reaffirmed a Feb. 18 message that advised all airlines using British airports to begin asking travelers if their baggage contained radios, computers or such equipment and then to examine the items for possible explosives.

The message did not say if examined items should be carried as hand baggage or be checked through with other luggage.

The Conservative Party government of Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher came under renewed attack Saturday for its handling of a bomb warning before Flight 103 blew up.

It was disclosed Friday that the Transport Department had prepared a warning dated Dec. 19 that included photographs of a bomb disguised in a radio-cassette player, but it did not mail the advisory until after Christmas.

Transport Secretary Paul Channon said the advice was of little importance because similar information had been disseminated a month earlier by the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration and by West Germany, where the flight originated.

Early editions of two Sunday newspapers, The Observer and The Sunday Telegraph, said the Dec. 19 warning carried details that would have helped security people spot a rigged radio-cassette player.