‘YOU CANNOT HAVE 100 PER CENT SECURITY’ - GORDON DEWAR

Airport security improvements since the Glasgow attack have focused on making the sites unpromising targets, according to Gordon Dewar, who was Glasgow’s managing director in 2007.

However, he said that was being achieved while also ensuring security was not so overwhelming it was unbearable.

Mr Dewar, who is now chief executive of Edinburgh Airport, said: “We are trying to make airports a very unattractive target – you will be caught and might lose your life.” That included close monitoring of the terminal to spot suspicious people, and the deployment of explosive-monitoring devices.

Other measures include minimising concentrations of people “landside”, such as by keeping check-in queues short and moving passengers through security as soon as possible to the greater safety of the “airside” of the terminal – the “core asset”.

There is also blast protection to prevent debris from any potential explosion becoming shrapnel.

Mr Dewar said: “Aviation leads the way in trying to get the balance right between very high quality protection and it completely consuming the way we want to live our lives.

“We have clearly eliminated the risk of a vehicle being driven into the building – people should feel safe from that form of attack.”

However, he added: “You cannot have 100 per cent security, because airports are open to the public. Nothing’s foolproof.”