Chile’s Santiago International Airport had constantly been a target for robberies and heists and yesterday another incident occurred at the airport.
Attempted Hesit On LATAM At Chile’s Santiago Airport
On Wednesday, March 8, 2023, a LATAM flight from Miami(MIA) to Santiago(SCL) was targeted by an attempted heist. It has been reported that the inbound aircraft operated by Boeing B787 was carrying cash equivalent to $32.5 million that were headed to banks in Chile.
Somehow the robbers were aware of the cargo with multimillion dollars in cash and planned for the heist on Wednesday. Between 10 to 12 armed robbers managed to pass through the airport’s security checkpoint and reach the airside where they attacked the ground workers as they were moving the valuable cargo off from the aircraft.
Eduardo Baeza, a prosecutor tasked with leading the investigation said:
“Valuable cargo arrived on a LATAM plane from Miami which was to be taken by the Brinks company, at which point the subjects burst into the area and were repelled by security officials.”
You can see from the video that surfaced on Twitter that there was a firefight around a parked LATAM B787-9 which carried the cash.
Other footage is shown from the flight deck and the cabin respectively, presumably from one of the captains on the LATAM flight. It shows one security officer performing CPR on a fallen officer and the other showers one of the robbers being killed.
Unfortunately, there had been two fatalities reported. A security officer and one robber were killed during the firefight. The remaining robbers managed to flee the scene and later two burned vehicles were found to cover their tracks and identities.
Delta Airlines A350-900 At Santiago Airport Damaged By This Incident
As soon as the firefight happened between the armed robbers and security officials, some of the bullets ended up hitting Delta’s Airbus A350 that was parked beside LATAM. However, the damages were not severe to affect the aircraft’s airworthiness and currently, the aircraft is flying on its way to Atlanta.
The affected Delta flight is registered as N574DZ, Delta DL147, which flew from Atlanta to Santiago a day before.
Not The First Time Of A Kind In Chile
What’s more interesting is this is not the first time airports in Chine encountered the robbery of valuable cargo. Organized crime has been a concern in Chile recently, and the airport has been targeted in the past. Back in 2020, robbers successfully stole $15 million in the airport’s warehouse and prior to that 17 million dollars were stolen as well.
Chile’s Directorate General of Civil Aviation, Victor Villalobos Collao, announced plans to prevent the further heist from happening in the future. But I assume that there could be an inside man who notified the robbers about the cargo.
Summary
On Wednesday, March 8, 2023, a failed heist at Chile’s Santiago International Airport left two dead. A LATAM B787 from Miami was the target as it carried 32.5 million dollars worth of cash that was to be delivered to several banks in Chile.
The remaining robbers fled the scene after an exchange of gunfight and Chilean authorities are currently investigating this incident.
