Some people who attended the Ariana Grande concert said security seemed lax.
Despite worldwide strides to improve security since 2001, experts said the suicide bombing Monday in Manchester demonstrated the difficulty defending large public venues such as concerts and sporting events.
England is a model for the widespread use of closed-circuit television cameras to track suspicious people with facial recognition. But some people who attended the Ariana Grande concert on Monday said security was lax at the 21,000-seat Manchester Arena, where a bomber killed at least 22 and injured 59.
“Clearly you have large crowds of people approaching and lining up, which makes them vulnerable, ” said Anthony Roman, a security expert at Roman & Associates in Lynbrook, N.Y. “All of this provides a rich target environment for terrorists.”
A Czech woman, Nikola Trochtova, who heard an explosion as she was leaving the concert, told a public radio station that “there was almost no security check, rather zero. They let us get in without any check if we have anything with us.”
The January shooting deaths of five people at the Fort Lauderdale airport serves as a reminder of the difficulty guarding against terrorists even at airports outside the security checkpoints. Sports stadiums or concert halls are also difficult to defend because of the number of gates and the large crowds.
The New York Police Department bolstered its presence at high-profile locations such as Times Square the day after the Manchester bombing. But spokesman Peter Donald said the moves were precautionary, and there were no credible threats against the city.
U. S. sporting events and concerts increasingly screen attendees with metal detectors and bag checks. But the Manchester bombing occurred after the concert in the arena’s foyer, which connects the venue with the Victoria train and tram station. A car bomb outside the venue could have also been devastating, experts say.
John Poncy, a former Army soldier and security expert as CEO of The Densus Group, said there is a push for venues to demonstrate they are providing security through metal detectors or by erecting bollards to block car bombs. But extending that perimeter is costly and difficult.
“If somebody has explosives strapped to their body and hasn’ t gone through the metal detector, I don’ t know that there is all that much that can be done, ” Poncy said. “At this point, it becomes really a question of police doing everything they can to track known perpetrators.”
Screening, public watchfulness, police attention and medical response have all improved dramatically since the Sept. 11 attacks, Roman said.
But security at large public venues could be improved by spreading out police and having them face outward to scan for suspicious characters, as happens in Israel, rather than clustering together in groups, as happens in many Western countries, he said.
The first suicide bomber at the Istanbul airport in June 2016 detonated his explosive when a security official at the door confronted the suspect because he was wearing a puffy coat and holding the detonator away from his body, Roman said. But an inattentive pilot had just walked past the bomber, Roman said.
“There were far fewer casualties than there would have been, ” Roman said of the security official spotting the first of three bombers. “We’ re not seeing that done as effectively at stadiums.”
England has been a repeated target. The Manchester attack came precisely two months after Khalid Masood killed five people and injured 49 with a vehicle and stabbing attack March 22 in Westminster, and exactly four years after the killing of soldier Lee Rigby in Woolwich on May 22,2013, according to an analysis by IHS Markit.
The attack was the worst since a suicide bombing on London transport killed 52 and wounded 780 on July 7,2005.
Kit Nicholl, a security analyst at IHS Markit, said clues such as the timing and location of the Manchester bombing suggested the assault was meticulously planned and probably the result of more than one person. The Islamic State claimed credit for the attack, which U. S. officials were seeking to confirm.
“Reconnaissance work would likely have been done previously to identify the most vulnerable area at the perimeter of the venue, ” Nicholl said. “The attacker would also have held back for the concert to come to an end, in order to target the crowd of people leaving the arena.”
Terrorists might have targeted children to create more outrage about the attack, experts said. An 8-year-old girl was among those killed and 12 children under the age of 16 were among the injured, according to British authorities.
“These are not military targets. They have no value in terms of strategic targeting, ” Roman said. “They are looking for the emotional impact to wear down the society’s will, to change hearts and minds.”
The use of knives, vehicles and explosives is more common in United Kingdom attacks than elsewhere in Europe because of strict gun-control laws, according to IHS Markit. But the open question is when a similar attack might occur in the U. S.
Dan Coats, the director of national intelligence, told the Senate Armed Services Committee on Tuesday that the attack was a reminder the terrorist threat is real.
“It’s not going away and it needs significant attention, ” Coats said.
Contributing: Kevin Johnson and The Associated Press.
