Air France grounds L.A. jets

Acting on specific intelligence, the French prime minister asked Air France on Wednesday to cancel six flights between Paris and Los Angeles on Christmas Eve and Christmas for fear of potential terrorist actions.

The decision, made at the request of the U.S. Embassy in Paris, came after intelligence officials intercepted e-mail from Al Qaeda suggesting that another Sept. 11-style attack was in the works over Christmas.

The intercepted Al Qaeda communication referred specifically to Air France, according to a knowledgeable U.S. official. Other information pointed to a handful of specific Air France flights, and intelligence officials have come to believe strongly that Al Qaeda operatives have somehow infiltrated the airline, the official said.

Based on that information, and the overall strength of intelligence pointing to imminent Al Qaeda attacks, U.S. law-enforcement and intelligence officials during the weekend began scouring booking records for Air France flights, including passenger and crew data, officials said.

In another a sign of the jitters about a possible terrorist attack using aircraft during the holiday season, federal officials granted the city of Chicago’s request and temporarily barred planes from flying over downtown Chicago at altitudes below 3,000 feet without approval.

And a Delta terminal at New York’s LaGuardia Airport was evacuated late Wednesday after a passenger had breached security. Authorities later reopened the terminal and rescreened all passengers, delaying 10 flights.

Officials were confident Wednesday night, based on the strength of the information they had, that grounding the Air France flights had thwarted at least a portion of whatever Al Qaeda was planning.

But serious concerns remain among intelligence and law-enforcement officials that other plots could be under way, and American operatives and analysts were scurrying Wednesday night to gather more information on the widely varying threats that sources are reporting.

The American official with knowledge of the intelligence said of the Air France flights: “This might have just been part of the mix. That’s the problem. There’s so much of this we still don’t know.”

In recent days, the Department of Homeland Security raised the terrorist threat level to orange–the second highest level–but declined to discuss specific threats.

Nevertheless, French Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin issued a statement Wednesday saying he had asked Air France to cancel the flights based on information developed by U.S.-French anti-terrorism operations.

“Air France has canceled the flights scheduled for Wednesday and Thursday, Dec. 24 and 25, between Paris and Los Angeles,” the statement from Raffarin’s office said.

“This measure was taken at the request of Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin on the basis of information, currently being checked, which was gathered in the framework of Franco-American cooperation in the fight against terrorism and which was of a nature to threaten the safety of these flights,” the statement said.

The U.S. Homeland Security Department did not return phone calls requesting comment.

The cancellations, which affected flights from Paris to Los Angeles and back, stranded hundreds of holiday travelers.

“Air France is working to take care of its customers and is trying to find the best way to reroute them,” a spokeswoman said.

The cancellations came two years after Richard Reid tried to detonate explosives in his shoes during an American Airlines flight from Paris to Miami. Reid, a British convert to Islam, was sentenced to life in prison.

Billie Vincent, an aviation security expert who formerly headed security for the Federal Aviation Administration, called the flight cancellations “extremely unusual.”

Vincent said Charles de Gaulle Airport in Paris has never been considered particularly secure, and in recent months, intelligence officials have been concerned that airport insiders–including pilots–could execute an attack.

“The most difficult thing to protect against is an insider,” Vincent said. “The most difficult thing to protect against is a pilot who may be ideologically motivated for the Al Qaeda group.”

Al Qaeda is considered responsible for the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001, that left about 3,000 people dead at the World Trade Center, the Pentagon and rural Pennsylvania after four U.S. airliners were commandeered and used as missiles.

The canceled flights scheduled for Wednesday included two from Paris and one from Los Angeles. They were Flights 68, 69 and 70. Flight 70 was scheduled to continue on to Papeete, Tahiti.

Two flights from Los Angeles and one from Paris on Christmas also were canceled. They were Flights 68, 69 and 71.

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David Stempler, president of the Air Travelers Association, an advocacy group for consumers, said airline security officials have been worried in recent days about terrorists infiltrating the airlines and the airports, as well as poorly secured cargo planes.

“I think to some degree the system is working,” Stempler said. “They’re finding things and taking action.”

In Los Angeles, Sahar Moridani, a spokeswoman for Mayor James Hahn, said the mayor is in constant contact with Los Angeles Police Chief William Bratton and local and federal law-enforcement officials about security measures.

“As the second largest city in the country, we are continuing to take all appropriate measures to help ensure the safety and security of Los Angeles during this period of heightened security,” Moridani said.

Effective Wednesday morning, the Los Angeles International Airport began prohibiting all dropoff and pickup of passengers in the central terminal area for the remainder of the holiday period. Hahn ordered the change as a security precaution.

At the French Embassy in Washington, spokeswoman Natalie Loiseau said the decision to cancel the flights followed a number of meetings in France in consultation with U.S. officials.