VANCOUVER – Transit Police lost explosive materials aboard an Air Canada plane during a 2011 training exercise in Vancouver and didn’t realize it was missing for two days, according to documents obtained by the Canadian Taxpayers Federation.
The plane had already flown to Toronto by the time a police dog handler admitted he misplaced the explosives. The bottle carrying the volatile substance was never found after the aircraft was searched 14 times.
Transit Police spokeswoman Anne Drennan said the officer has since resigned after a host of protocols were broken during the exercise meant to train bomb-sniffing dogs up to the RCMP standard.
“This was human error. It shouldn’t have happened and we’ve taken as many steps as we can think of to ensure that this never happens again,” she said, adding Transit Police no longer use in-service aircraft for such exercises and officers must keep a log when using explosive materials.
