Lessons learned from 11th September, 2001 (9/11): A comparison of aviation security and health crisis response

The terrorist attacks of 11th September, 2001 (9/11) triggered significant changes in the way aviation security is implemented all over the world. Despite many lessons learned in the industry, the response to the COVID-19 pandemic has been the same as those prompted by 9/11 — the imposition of prescribed, disproportionate to risk, one-size-fits-all measures with adverse impacts on operations. Taking the learning from a major world crisis such as 9/11 has shown how an intelligence-driven, risk-based, outcome-focused regulatory model enables the industry to determine how a known threat informed by intelligence might manifest in terms of likelihood and consequence that is unique to every airport. Together, ACI and Arup have identified the top ten lessons learnt from the security experience that can be directly applied to manage health risks in aviation. The paper explores the lessons learned for airports (recommendations 1–5) before identifying those learned for regulators (recommendations 6–10).