Situation
Following the downing of MetroJet Flight 9268 over the Sinai Peninsula in October 2015 and the subsequent downturn in the Egyptian tourism industry, Control Risks was approached by a public relations company embedded with the Egyptian Ministry of Tourism to see whether we would be interested in undertaking a security review at a number of airports in Egypt.
In less than a week we had submitted a proposal and were giving a presentation of our proposed solution to the Egyptian Prime Minister and the cabinet. In a press conference held on 22 December 2015, it was announced that our bid had been successful and we were to be awarded the contract. It was also announced at the press conference that the first airports to be reviewed would be Sharm el-Shiekh, Marsa Alam and Cairo.
Control Risks’ approach
In order to address the requirements of the Egyptian authorities, Control Risks conducted security reviews at three Egyptian airports in accordance with the relevant ICAO and National Aviation Security Programme (NASP) standards. We provided the client with a threat and risk assessment, followed by key mitigation strategies to decrease the airport’s exposure to identified risks. The client applied Control Risks’ recommended mitigation measures, thereby reducing the airport’s level of exposure to security risk.
Client outcome
We produced individual reports for each airport. Our reports presented our review findings and gave detailed recommendations on how to rectify deficiencies. We also provided overarching analysis of the three review findings to look for systemic or common issues across all three airports. The results of this analysis were provided in a separate report and were used at a ministerial level to shape the discussion on how future regulation of the industry should be undertaken.