00:00 13 July 2012
Further blunders for private firm G4S, who were granted the exclusive security contract for the London 2012 Olympic Games, have been exposed by a whistleblower who shockingly revealed that there's a "50% chance" of a bomb passing through the undertrained security teams.
With the Games due to begin in two weeks' time, the news could be a devastating blow to the firm's reputation especially given that the Army has had to supply troops to fill in G4S's gaps.
Speaking to Sky News, the whistleblower claimed that basic tasks were being failed such as one guard failing to find a 9mm pistol hidden in a volunteer's sock during a pat-down. In another example a mock terrorist put a fake bomb through an X-ray scanner and still managed to blend into the crowd and escape seamlessly.
The whistleblower claims that undertrained volunteers are still being given a badge and clearance in what many media outlets are considering a remarkably rushed affair given that the Games were secured to London seven years ago.
The G4S whistleblower told Sky: "I can see so many security loopholes for this event. Security staff are given a very short time to achieve their training and there is a very slack approach.
"During my employment I planted pretend IEDs, decommissioned weapons, knives and other large metallic objects on students and sent them through the metal detectors.
"They're not being seen by X-ray staff and they're not being picked up during physical searches, so the training is completely insufficient."
The whistleblower went on to hazard a guess on the security background of the guards, believing that 99% had no security background and "many have language problems," he added, "so they won't be able to communicate with ticketholders and many completely lack confidence."
The unnamed man concluded: "I think if you walked through into one of the Olympic venues with a lethal capability on you then you have a 50 per cent chance of getting through that screening procedure and getting into the venue."
The 2012 London Olympics is seen as the biggest homeland security initiative Britain has ever undertaken while a BBC report states the MI5 has highlighted three considerable threats to the Games. They are: An attack by al-Qaeda or its affiliates on American or Israeli athletes/spectators; An attack (or hoax) by Irish republican dissidents to create disruption; Violent culture clashes between rival groups of foreign nationals visiting London during the event.