Annex 17 is the security annex: Safeguarding International Civil Aviation Against Acts of Unlawful Interference. The exam wants its vocabulary, its objectives, a handful of preventive standards a pilot meets in daily line flying (screening, escorted prisoners, weapons on board) and the choreography for an aircraft that has actually been seized, which is scattered by design across Annex 17, Annex 2, Annex 6, Annex 14 and Doc 4444. This lesson gathers all of it.
The vocabulary
Aviation security — safeguarding civil aviation against acts of unlawful interference, achieved by a combination of measures and human and material resources.
Airside — the movement area of an airport, adjacent terrain and buildings or portions thereof, ACCESS TO WHICH IS CONTROLLED.
Security restricted area — those areas of the airside identified as PRIORITY RISK areas, where in addition to access control, OTHER security controls are applied.
Screening — the application of technical or other means intended to identify and/or detect weapons, explosives or other dangerous devices, articles or substances which may be used to commit an act of unlawful interference.
Security control — a means by which the introduction of such weapons, explosives or dangerous devices, articles or substances can be PREVENTED.
Aircraft security check — an inspection of the interior of an aircraft to which passengers may have had access, and of the hold, for the purpose of discovering suspicious objects, weapons, explosives or other dangerous devices, articles and substances. (The aircraft security SEARCH is the thorough version: interior AND exterior.)
Unidentified baggage — baggage at an airport, with or without a baggage tag, which is not picked up by or identified with a passenger.
Security inspection — an announced or unannounced examination of the effectiveness of the implementation of specific security measures.
The objectives, and the programme pyramid
The objectives read like a mission statement, and the first sentence is the exam's favourite: each Contracting State shall have as its primary objective the safety of passengers, crew, ground personnel and the general public in all matters related to safeguarding against acts of unlawful interference. To that end each State establishes an organization and regulations, practices and procedures which protect that safety AND are capable of responding rapidly to meet any increased security threat, taking into account the safety, regularity and efficiency of flights.
The machinery is a pyramid of written programmes, from the top down:
National civil aviation security programme — the State's own programme, at the top of the pyramid.
Airport security programme — below it, each airport's written programme.
Aircraft operator security programme — at the operational base, the requirement the syllabus names: each State, as the State of the Operator, ensures its commercial air transport operators have established, implemented and maintained a WRITTEN programme meeting the requirements of the national civil aviation security programme of the State of the Operator. Foreign operators serving a State are required to maintain written supplementary station procedures meeting that State's national programme.
Preventive measures
Prevention starts with a blunt object rule: each State establishes measures to prevent weapons, explosives or any other dangerous devices, articles or substances which may be used to commit an act of unlawful interference, and whose carriage or bearing is NOT AUTHORISED, from being introduced by any means whatsoever on board an aircraft engaged in civil aviation. The screening system enforces it, and it has a self-healing rule: screened passengers and their cabin baggage are protected from unauthorised interference from the screening point to the aircraft, and if mixing or contact with unscreened persons does take place, the passengers concerned and their cabin baggage shall be RE-SCREENED before boarding.
Two special cases follow. For passengers obliged to travel because they have been the subject of judicial or administrative proceedings (deportees, prisoners under escort), States develop carriage requirements, operators build measures and procedures into their security programmes, and, the pilot-facing rule: the aircraft operator AND the pilot-in-command are informed when such passengers are to be carried, so that appropriate security controls can be applied. And for weapons on board: carriage by law enforcement officers and other authorised persons acting in the performance of their duties requires special authorisation in accordance with the laws of the States involved; in other cases a weapon travels only when an authorised and duly qualified person has determined it is not loaded (if applicable) and it is stowed in a place inaccessible to any person during flight time; and the pilot-in-command is notified of the number of armed persons on board and their seat locations. In-flight security officers, where a State deploys them, are specially selected and trained government personnel whose deployment is coordinated with the States concerned and kept strictly confidential.
When the fence fails: response to unlawful seizure
For an aircraft that has been seized, Annex 17 tasks every State it approaches: each Contracting State shall provide assistance to an aircraft subjected to an act of unlawful seizure, including the provision of navigation aids, air traffic services and permission to land, as may be necessitated by the circumstances. Once it lands, the State takes measures, as practicable, to ensure the aircraft is DETAINED ON THE GROUND, with a single exception: unless its departure is necessitated by the overriding duty to protect human life, the measures recognising the grave hazard attending further flight. The landing State consults where practicable with the State of the Operator, and notifies the States of assumed or stated destination — and, by the most expeditious means, the State of Registry, the State of the Operator and ICAO.
The seized aircraft's own script: Annex 2
Annex 2 addresses the crew. The rule of the air itself: an aircraft subjected to unlawful interference shall endeavour to notify the appropriate ATS unit of the fact, of significant circumstances, and of any deviation from the flight plan (so ATS can give it priority and minimise conflict), and the pilot-in-command shall attempt to land as soon as practicable at the nearest suitable aerodrome, or at a dedicated aerodrome assigned by the appropriate authority, unless considerations aboard the aircraft dictate otherwise. Where the crew CANNOT notify anyone, Attachment B's guidance takes over: attempt to continue flying on the assigned track and at the assigned cruising level at least until able to notify an ATS unit or until within radar or ADS-B coverage.
If the aircraft must depart from its assigned track or cruising level without radiotelephony contact, the pilot-in-command should, whenever possible: attempt to broadcast warnings on the VHF channel in use or the VHF emergency frequency, and other appropriate channels (using transponders and data links where advantageous); follow any regional in-flight contingency procedures from Doc 7030; or, where none exist, proceed at a level differing from the normal IFR cruising levels by 150 m (500 ft) where a 300 m (1,000 ft) vertical separation minimum applies, or by 300 m (1,000 ft) where a 600 m (2,000 ft) minimum applies: the offset is half the prevailing separation, splitting the gap between occupied levels. (Older question banks still key this rule to FL 290, offsetting 500 ft below it and 1,000 ft above: a pre-RVSM version superseded in the mid-2000s; the current rule follows the applicable separation minimum, not the flight level.)
The hardened door, the lonely stand, the careful taxi
Annex 6 hardens the cockpit. In any aeroplane with a flight crew compartment door, the door shall be capable of being locked, with a means for cabin crew to DISCREETLY notify the flight crew of suspicious activity in the cabin. An approved, penetration-resistant door (proof against small-arms fire and grenade shrapnel and forcible intrusion) is required for passenger aeroplanes meeting any of three triggers: maximum certificated take-off mass over 54,500 kg; or over 45,500 kg combined with more than 19 passenger seats; or more than 60 passenger seats. That door is lockable and unlockable from either pilot's station, closed and locked from the closing of the external doors after embarkation until they open for disembarkation (except for authorised access), with means to monitor from either pilot's station the entire door area outside to identify who is asking to come in.
On the ground, geography does the protecting. Every aerodrome designates an isolated aircraft parking position (or advises the tower of suitable areas) for an aircraft known or believed to be the subject of unlawful interference, recommended to be at the maximum distance practicable and never less than 100 m from other parking positions, buildings or public areas, and not over underground utilities: gas, aviation fuel and, as far as feasible, electrical or communication cables. Doc 4444 closes the loop with the taxi clearance: such an aircraft shall be cleared to the designated isolated parking position (or to an area agreed with the aerodrome authority where none is designated), and the taxi clearance shall specify the taxi route, selected to minimise the security risks to the public, other aircraft and installations. An aircraft on the ground is meanwhile advised to remain as far from other aircraft and installations as possible and, if appropriate, to vacate the runway.