Aviation security and operational risks
Escalating global conflicts and airspace closures demand proactive aviation planning.
By Shannon Forrest
Contributing Writer
On Feb 28 of this year, the US and Israel launched Operation Epic Fury – a military action directed at Iran. The moment that missiles and ordnance began flying between the nations involved, the airspace was closed to all civilian traffic.
As of mid-March, the airspace over not only Iran, but Bahrain, Iraq, Kuwait, and Syria remains closed to commercial and business aircraft, while nearby airspace in Israel, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE is heavily restricted, with limited routings and reduced capacity for overflights.
Just a month earlier, on Jan 3, the US used military assets to enter Venezuela to capture and extract its leader, Nicolás Maduro. During the raid, FAA issued an emergency NOTAM restricting all civil flight operations of US aircraft in Venezuelan airspace.
At the same time, FAA closed the San Juan Flight Information Region (FIR), which overlies Puerto Rico and several nearby islands. Adjoining FIRs not controlled by FAA restricted US-based aircraft from entering.
Once restrictions were lifted, NOTAMs remained in place to advise crews of potential hazardous situations.
As another example in the Americas, in late February 2026, cartel violence in Mexico caused a temporary shutdown of several airports, including PVR (Puerto Vallarta).
Although airport infrastructure reopened quickly, ground routes to and from the airport were cut off, preventing passengers and crew from reaching their aircraft.
Is it possible to plan ahead of these situations?
Over the past several months, there has been a sizable uptick in international events that have affected private and commercial aviation operations significantly.
These events seem to occur with little advance warning, meaning pilots may face unplanned security-based decisions while en route and airborne, as preflight expectations are nullified by rapidly unfolding situations.
Heavyweight boxing champion Mike Tyson is credited with the quote “Everybody has a plan until they get punched in the face,” meaning an unexpected situation has a way of upending the best-laid plans.
The best way to deal with a disaster is not to be there in the first place.
If the destination is a “must-go,” the National Business Aviation Association (NBAA) suggests that a best practice is to refuel for the outbound leg upon arrival, rather than waiting for the departure date.
This puts the aircraft in a “bug-out-ready” state, allowing it to get airborne as soon as possible if the need to leave arises.
If the exact fuel load can’t be determined, adding enough fuel to reach a friendlier destination is a prudent measure in case evacuation becomes imminent.
Conservative fuel reserves above IFR minimums are another ad hoc insurance policy.
Eastern Caribbean airports tend to have a single runway. Using the next island over as an alternate is a common strategy, but one FIR boundary closure or restriction can affect a host of airports.
For instance, the Piarco FIR (east of Puerto Rico) provides services to the Lesser Antilles chain. A single point of failure can cascade into a significant problem by restricting landing sites.
Another consideration when operating in an area with ongoing military operations is the degradation or loss of GPS signals. This may be the time to dust off the FMS manual and review how to revert to raw data navigation should it become necessary.
While it’s unlikely that a pilot flying a modern glass-cockpit aircraft will attempt a raw data DME arc, cross-checking positions with ground-based navigational aids, or tracking to or from a fix, might prove valuable in some instances.
The gold standard for international security is to research the destination thoroughly in advance and maintain situational awareness of changing conditions or escalating tensions.
International flight planning services include this as part of the dispatch package, but there are also numerous resources that pilots can use themselves.
For instance, the US State Department travel advisory webpage, travel.state.gov, provides numerical destination rankings from 1 to 4, with higher numbers indicating greater risk.
Level 1 advises travelers to exercise normal precautions (eg, Barbados), while level 4 carries the admonition, “Do not travel” (eg, Belarus, Venezuela, and Yemen). Specific risks, such as unrest, crime, hostage-taking, wrongful detention, health risks, natural disaster, and terrorism, are also provided.
The Smart Traveler Enrollment Program (STEP) is a free service that sends e-mail alerts from US embassies and consulates based on a traveler’s destination and travel dates. Enrollees set up an account and enter their itineraries.
Aircraft security
In terms of physical aircraft security, most European and Asian destinations have far stricter access controls than most places in the US. Remote ramp parking, followed by transportation of crew and passengers to a facility for customs processing, is a common practice.
The remote parking location itself can serve as a deterrent to tampering. Corporate pilots, especially those who fly internationally, tend to be familiar with their passengers – who are usually the company CEO or top-ranking executives.
As of mid-March, airspace over Iran, Bahrain, Iraq, Kuwait, and Syria remains closed to commercial and business aircraft, with nearby nations like Israel, Qatar, and Saudi Arabia heavily restricted.
This contrasts with airline operations, where 200 strangers in the back present an element of risk.
Asked about the use of physical aircraft security devices, like embedded alarms, one Fortune 200 international captain revealed that these systems tend to generate many false positives due to inadvertent aircraft movement or weather conditions.
For that reason, some crews avoid them and instead set up “tells,” or use techniques such as positioning items in specific ways known only to them. Any disruption or repositioning of a “tell” may indicate the aircraft has been entered or tampered with.
Security tape that leaves residue upon opening has been around for a long time, but it has limitations as it’s subject to human error and complacency, and it gives an intruder an obvious target to defeat.
More subtle and secret means of detecting unauthorized entry can be more effective. For instance, installing pins from the inside on emergency exits ensures that someone with nefarious intent cannot enter through means reserved for rescue crews.
Once at the destination, the most vulnerable time for passengers is during ground transportation between the FBO, hotel, and business location.
Some larger corporate flight departments have a policy of positioning security teams in advance to protect executives and crew when traveling to risky international destinations. Others use handlers to arrange private transportation and other resources.
Vetting vendors is critical, and being inconspicuous – or, as intelligence services term it, being a “gray man” – can go a long way. Wearing a Bud Light T-shirt or a Chicago Bears ballcap screams “American” and can make you a target when out for meals or sightseeing. Dressing like a local makes you less obvious.
Know what fellow travelers are saying
Unfortunately, the difference between scrupulous and unscrupulous handlers may come down to the highest bidder, or there may be undisclosed financial relationships between handlers and subcontractors. Reports from other pilots, dispatchers, and schedulers can be invaluable in these situations.
OpsGroup (ops.group) is a membership-based organization with nearly 10,000 members who provide real-time reports focused on international flight operations.
Personal and team memberships are available. Currently, a one-person plan is $36 per month if paid annually.
At the other end of the spectrum, a team of 50 costs $12 per person per month.
Every day, OpsGroup sends out a brief that highlights operational changes across 18 categories, and each week it produces an international operations bulletin.
Other benefits include George, a search bot that generates answers to questions on topics such as trip reports, permits, and risks.
Airport Spy is a collection of reports submitted by users on airports, air traffic control, and handlers – essentially the TripAdvisor or Yelp of international operations, providing a Pirep-like insight into service providers.
OpsGroup-specific Slack channels allow members to interact on a wide range of relevant topics. Users report that the information received is free from governmental bias or withholding, which are issues that sometimes occur when obtaining intelligence through official regulatory channels.
Secure communication
Effective, reliable, and protected communication while traveling internationally is a must. Corporate-issued devices, or devices with corporate software or applications installed, can be compromised through a cyberattack.
On Mar 13 of this year, a cyberattack against Stryker Corp’s Microsoft environment affected more than 200,000 servers, many of whom reported that their personal electronic devices (PEDs) were reset to factory settings. Everything from applications to contact lists became inaccessible.
One can imagine the implications this would have for flight department operations as crew members tried to communicate with each other or with passengers, or the impact on any aviation-related tools stored on a phone or tablet. It illustrates how digitally vulnerable society has become.
A workaround employed by some departments is the issuance of prepaid or “burner” phones when traveling to high-risk destinations. Some even carry an emergency handheld satellite phone that can be used in a network- or grid-down situation.
Messaging apps
It’s worth noting that the perceived use of messaging apps as a means of securing communications may not be as reliable as it seems. Telegram has become a popular platform, and most users believe it offers secure communication.
It is advertised as offering end-to-end encryption (E2EE), but that only applies to one-to-one chats (not groups), and, by default, encryption is turned off.
Telegram has ties to Russian intelligence agencies, and has its operations center in Dubai. Those who are familiar with these matters believe the company engages in metadata mining, which means that anything said in a flight department group message on Telegram is wide open to prying eyes.
Aircraft movements, logistics, hotel reservations, contact names and numbers, and anything else mentioned in a chat are accessible, and are no more secure than standard e-mails stored unencrypted on a server.
For encryption to occur on Telegram, users must toggle on a “secret chat” – which, again, is off by default.
WhatsApp is owned by Facebook, so one can draw one’s own conclusions about data mining and privacy. The Signal app, which is on by default, offers the strongest level of encryption. Group chats in Signal are secure if you control and know who is in the group.
The weak point of secure messaging apps seems to be getting people to use them. It’s just too easy to send a standard text message, which remains the go-to for most users, despite being the least secure.
There’s also the argument that using encrypted messaging implies you’re hiding something, which is technically true, but the intent is security, not illicit activity.
Contingency plans
It’s always best to have an emergency extraction plan in case things turn bad quickly and transportation to the airport is affected. Although digital financial tools like Apple Pay, Venmo, and Zelle have become the norm, a crisp US $20 bill can make a lot happen, especially in a poorer country.
It’s more prevalent among the younger generation, but it’s somewhat shocking how many pilots no longer carry any cash. Under normal circumstances, transactions are handled digitally, but what happens in a blackout? What if your phone dies? What if your phone is hacked?
Cash speaks volumes in an emergency. However, there’s one exception to this – cryptocurrency, specifically Bitcoin. There are 2 diametrically opposed schools of thought when it comes to Bitcoin—that it’s a scam or ruse, or that it represents the greatest freedom from government-issued currency in history.
There’s also the belief that it’s a tool of the seedy underworld used to support illicit activity and launder money.
However, it is legal, easy to transfer from person to person with a phone-based application like Strike, and represents a cash alternative when US dollars won’t suffice. Fifty dollars in Bitcoin can garner a lot of favor at the push of a button.
If all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail. The key to security is to have options. There is a slogan in special ops circles that “two is one, and one is none.”
In other words, always plan for something to fail. If you only have one option, it’s reduced to zero. The slogan also has a punchline – “Three is for me.” If you must go, having a backup to the backup is a tool worth having.
Shannon Forrest is a current line pilot, CRM facilitator, and aviation safety consultant. He has more than 15,000 hrs TT and holds a degree in behavioral psychology.