The companies allegedly offered the hazardous material for transportation when it was not packaged, marked, classed, described, labeled or in condition for shipment as required by regulations. Radioactive materials, with some exceptions, may not be shipped as cargo aboard passenger aircraft. The proposed civil penalty for IIS & Allied Services is $227,500; and for Gallant Freight, $195,000. IIS and Gallant have 30 days from receipt of the FAA letters to respond to the agency.

In 2006, during the investigation into the death of a former Russian spy Alexander Litvinenko, it was learned that a number of British Airways aircraft that flew between Moscow and London had been contaminated with radioactive material. Alexander Valterovich Litvinenko was an officer who served in the Soviet KGB and its Russian successor, the Federal Security Service (FSB). In November 1998, Litvinenko and several other FSB officers publicly accused their superiors of ordering the assassination of Russian tycoon and oligarch Boris Berezovsky.

Litvinenko was arrested the following March on charges of exceeding his authority at work. He was acquitted in November 1999 but re-arrested before the charges were again dismissed in 2000. He fled with his family to London and was granted asylum in the United Kingdom, where he became a journalist and writer.

During his time in London Litvinenko authored two books, "Blowing up Russia: Terror from within" and "Lubyanka Criminal Group," where he accused Russian secret services of staging the Russian apartment bombings and other terrorism acts in an effort to bring Vladimir Putin to power. He also accused Putin of ordering the murder of Russian journalist Anna Politkovskaya.