An eight month trial of a system capable of checking every bag from a particular flight for the presence of narcotics has been carried out at a major UK airport. The British Aerospace CONDOR tandem mass-spectrometer system, fitted with a real-time sampler, was used to check in-coming baggage for a range of illegal drugs. Because of the rapid sampling and analysis capability of this instrument, it was possible to check every bag from a flight without delay to the passengers. During the trial a very large number of bags, from flights from various parts of the world, were sampled. A number of detections were made, which resulted in a number of seizures and the apprehension of a number of smugglers.

Date Published: 6 October 1994
PDF: 9 pages
Proc. SPIE 2276, Cargo Inspection Technologies, (6 October 1994); doi: 10.1117/12.189185

Published in SPIE Proceedings Vol. 2276:
Cargo Inspection Technologies
Andre H. Lawrence, Editor(s)