Military Overflights Continuing

by Jonah Wed Nov 05, 2003 11:07

To ask the Minister for Transport the number of US troops who have passed through Shannon Airport every month in 2003.
- Seán Crowe.
To ask the Minister for Transport the number of US troops who have passed through Shannon Airport every month in 2003.
- Seán Crowe.

* For WRITTEN answer on Tuesday, 4th November, 2003.



Answered by the Minister for Transport.
(Séamus Brennan).

REPLY

Civilian air carriers carrying weapons or munitions, wishing to land or over-fly Irish airspace are obliged to seek exemption from the provisions of Sections 6 & 7 of the Air Navigation (Carriage of Munitions of War, Weapons and Dangerous Goods) Order 1973. This Order applies only to the carriage of munitions of war, weapons and dangerous goods and not to military personnel. There is no limitation on the carriage of military troops on civilian aircraft if they are unaccompanied by weapons or munitions, as is sometimes the case. Therefore my Department does not collate information with regard to the number of military troops onboard civilian aircraft.

On the basis of information collected by Aer Rianta the numbers of troops traveling on civilian aircraft are as follows:

January 18.123
February 10,206
March 9,584
April 879
May 7,868
June 6,747
July 13,682
August 4,825
September 9,876

by plane spotter Wed Nov 05, 2003 15:39

This is dated from Nov 1st

From: the Peacewatchers at USAFs Fairford and Welford bases in the UK

Since Saturday November 1, people in the Highlands of Scotland have been witnessing large movements of US warplanes overhead. Experienced observers say the large numbers are reminiscent of those that preceded the bombing of Iraq in 1998 and military strikes on Libya in the1980's as well as the first Gulf War.

At the weekend warplanes were flying over at a rate of roughly one every 15 minutes. As well as watching them from the ground the plane spotters have also been able to overhear pilots talking by listening to their radio frequencies.

At this rate some 288 warplanes would have passed over Scotland in three days.

It is thought that the planes have flown on a route from the US over the north pole to bases in Europe and the Mediterranean. The size and scale of the movement suggests that the US may be preparing to strike at a country in the Middle East in the next week to ten days.

Please pass this information on as widely as possible- the US may be planning to use the pretext of "foreign" terrorist attacks on US personnel in Iraq to attack Iran or Syria. Please alert any sympathetic elected representatives, media representatives and other sympathetic organisations. Publicising this military movement may prevent the air-strikes.

SCOTTISH CND, 15 Barrland Street, Glasgow, G41 1QH. Tel: 0141 423 1222

by Dave Aldridge - spirals Sat Nov 08, 2003 17:20 spirals at eircom dot net +353 907 62967

While the figures for MILITERY aircraft over flying Ireland may be correct. Shannon Air Radio (Callsign SHANWICK) located at BALLYGIREEN County Clare (for background including short wave channels used see www.irishaviation.net/shanwick.htm) has been handling traffic for many more NATO and US aircraft including relaying MILITERY information to and from US and European USAF Command and Control Bases. (See also www.mbat.net/~goth/radio/shortwave.htm for other channel info. A good introduction to how the Air Traffic Control is set up for transatlantic flights is at www.canairradio.com/hf.html and a description of the USAF Global HF System is at www.monitoringtimes.com/mtghfs.html and www.dutchmil.com/freqs/hf/usaf.htm. A short list of frequencies used by Shanwick is at freespace.virgin.net/paul.hunt3/radio/ATCCC.HTML. Unfortunately although most of these transmissions are not scrambled they upper sideband Single Side band (SSB) transmissions so require a short wave communications receiver.
The contents of http://www.eurocontrol.int/eatmp/events/docs/avionics/Pres1_7_Thedford.pdf describe how the US Government has fitted their aircraft (USAF, Marine and US Navy) with civil aids so they can make use of normal airports. The result is that their traffic via Shanwick is almost impossible for a casual listener except for to differentiate US military aircraft communicating. The giveaway is the accent and some callsign prefixes. Originally they operated on a separate frequency and were more obvious, now they are handled with the commercial stuff, and there are only guarded references to relaying messages.

We believe the number of US military aircraft being handled by Shanwick to be much higher than the figures given, as many aircraft apparently fly direct to Germany, Scotland, and Iceland as well as Southern Europe, and would not be included in the Irish Governments counts. We have been unable to determine if aircraft are being refueled in flight but as most are commercial aircraft on contract ,would consider this is a development that has not yet happened.
BALLYGIREEN is the key without radio ther is no flow!!! stop the flow!!!
Hope this of help. dja.

by scottish Sun Nov 09, 2003 13:27

where they going?