BUFFALO, N.Y. (WIVB)- Homeland security experts say Americans traveling abroad are at risk following the attack at Ataturk Airport in Istanbul.
“It came as no surprise with the last attack, the Paris attacks, clearly ISIS had stepped up, assuming this was ISIS and it seems like it was, ISIS has stepped up its agenda over there,” says Steven MacMartin, who spent 31 years with the Department of Homeland Security.
MacMartin is also the program director for Medaille’s Homeland Security Bachelor of Science program.
“The fact that Turkey, which has a large problem, a large population of people who have left, gone to Syria or other hot spots in the Middle East and come back, they have a problem along their border with ISIS, not nearly a surprise,” says MacMartin.
He says airports are a target because large numbers of people are mulling around, often in security with nowhere to go.
“You can’t avoid them but you need to avoid the busy times because if terrorist is going to attack, they’re going to attack the busiest time of day and not early in the morning or late at night,” says MacMartin. “You also want to try to get through that check point as expeditiously as possible.”
He suggests not carrying on luggage and selecting the pre-check option to get through security.
The attack has members of the Turkish community in Buffalo nervous about traveling home.
“I was shocked with that bad news because I know that airport where they made the bomb explode,” said Hayreddin Ceker, the president of the Turkish Graduate Student Association at UB. “It’s very dense, a very big one kind of like at a central place of Istanbul.”
Ceker said he called his cousin who lives near the airport to make sure they were okay as soon as he heard the news. He condemns the attack.
“Terror everywhere, not just in Istanbul, it all destroys our common values so I think we should stand, all of us, against this things more than ever,” said Ceker.
The Turkish Cultural Center, which has an affiliation here in Buffalo, also condemns the attack. They say in a statement, “We stand united with the people of Turkey and with people around the world in mourning the loss of innocent lives… This heinous act of terrorism is an attack against all human values and unity.”
