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Terrorist Attack Simulated in Seattle

Aired May 12, 2003 - 14:58   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


JUDY WOODRUFF, CNN ANCHOR: An imaginary dirty bomb is about to explode in Seattle, kicking off the first large-scale terrorism drill in the United States since the September 11 attacks.
Let's go live now to Seattle and to CNN's Jeanne Meserve, Jeanne.

JEANNE MESERVE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Judy, in just a few moments, we're expected the simulated detonation of a dirty bomb outside the city of Seattle. If you look behind me you see the scenario they put in place, a lot of props. You see overturned and burned-out busses, automobiles, a big pile of rubble. Within the last half hour they've been putting people in here. These are actors that playing the parts of injured people. Some have been made up with makeup. They've been put in position here.

What's the point of all of this? Michael Burns, who is an official with the Department of Homeland Security, says there is nothing like exercising to prepare first responders. He spoke as someone who is a longtime veteran of the New York City Fire Department who dealt with not one, but two attacks on the World Trade Center.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It was that preparation that took place in the towers prior to getting struck by the planes that in 45 minutes everybody got out of those buildings.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MESERVE: Judy, I'm going to stay out of this shot so hopefully we will catch the detonation of this simulated dirty bomb. Let me tell you that the point here is not just to put first responders through the paces. It's to stress the entire system from the local level to the state level, on up to the federal level. They want to find out whether their communication systems really work, whether there is sharing of information, whether there's cooperation, whether there's excessive overlap. They want to really stress things to find out where there are friction points, to find out exactly where there are gaps.

Now, there are critics who say the players know too much about this in advance. They know the dirty bomb is going off in Seattle. They know later in the week there will be an outbreak of pneumonic plague in Chicago. But the people who are running the exercise assure that there will be surprises. Things are going to the players won't know about, that we don't know about, that will really test this homeland security apparatus we have in place whether it works or whether it doesn't.

Judy, back to you.

WOODRUFF: Jeanne, how do they pick this city?

How do they pick the cities they were going to do this exercise in?

MESERVE: They wanted to pick a couple of cities where they thought there was a real threat of something happening. And Seattle has had it's share of not incidents but scares, I guess you'd say. You remember that Ahmed Ressam was arrested coming back over the border of Canada during the Y2 celebrations. He apparently was headed for the city of Los Angeles, with some an explosives to do some damage there. They've had major demonstrations here centering around the World Trade Organization, things like that.

They have hydro plants here. They nuclear plants here. They also have here a threat of real natural disaster. And everything they learn from this terrorism exercise is applicable to that. There are -- we were talking to the head of the state Emergency Preparedness Office yesterday, and he was telling us one of the things they practice for here are tsunamis because there is a risk of an offshore earthquake that puts in a big wave here. So this is intended to stress the entire system, as well as for a possible terrorist incident.

WOODRUFF: And again, Jeanne, even though they know this is coming and they have had time to prepare for, they still believe that this kind of exercise makes a difference.

MESERVE: There are smaller localized exercises that take place all around the country on fairly frequently basis. And those will test out where local departments have the right protocols in place, whether they have done all of the right sort of planing. But this exercise is only the second of this nature that involves people from the local level on up to the state to federal level. This is called top off because, this stands for top officials.

And we have some important people in Washington playing their roles. Tom Ridge, the secretary of Homeland Security is playing his part. We're told Colin Powell, the secretary of state will be playing for part of the time. Tommy Thompson, the secretary of Health and Human Services also playing a role in this. There also have been briefings with heads of other agencies and departments.

One thing that you might say is lacking in all of this is Congress. Congress has been briefed on this. Some members will be observing the -- we had one Congressional representative from Washington state participating in a press conference here today. But there's nobody really playing the part of Congress in all of this. But once again, they think this kind of exercise gives them the big picture, like nothing else would do.

WOODRUFF: And Jeanne, I think you may have mentioned this, but a lot of talk about the cost for exercises like this. What do they say about that, about how much money goes into putting on a drill like this?

MESERVE: Well, you know, you get different stories when you talk to different people. You know how that happens. But the total price tag for this is $16 million, about $2 million going to the city of Seattle, to defray costs here, another $2 million going to the city of Chicago to do the same. There obviously are expenses involved in flying in some of the federal players who were on the ground in here. We know in Chicago, they're going to be flying in portions of the pharmaceutical stockpiles, so called, push packs. That's all going to take money. So that's what the $16 million is spent for. Now I have talked to people who feel there's efficiency in this. That they have not done a lot of smaller exercises and, in fact, saved money by conducting this.

Stop for a moment, we're hearing some sort of siren going off, but we've not seen anything out there that resembles a detonation. I'm surveying the scene to see what I can see. I see dust which appears to be from vehicles, but I've not seen anything else that resembles a detonation. We'll keep watching for, that while I keep talking then.

So Some people say that $16 million is well spent. We're going to learn a lot of lessons from this. I have, however, talked to other people who deal with Homeland Security matters who feel there are better ways this money could be spent.

I am seeing smoke rising from our perspective. We see it behind the buses. Perhaps you're picking that up on one of our cameras. So apparently, the simulated dirty bomb has gone off here in Seattle. Shortly, we'll see first responders rushing to the scene here. One fire official who I spoke with yesterday said the success or failure of their performance is going to hinge on the first 15 to 25 minutes. That's where you're really going to see whether they're dealing with this appropriately. By the time we enter the second hour, they should have system in place for dealing with this. At that point, things should become methodical.

Of course, this is different than anything this fire department has dealt with before a simulated radiological attack. Radioactivity is supposed to be spewing here, which means, of course, they'll have to take different sorts of precautions in this incident than they would in a standard one.

Back to the money issue for a moment. There are people who feel that this has the potential to be a real boondoggle. They say there has to be a really careful evaluation of this exercise to make sure that we are taking a very hard and very serious look at what went wrong. You and I both hang around Washington, we know sometimes there's a tendency to want to gloss over some of the hard, cold facts, particularly when those facts have to do with failures. And so two points of view on whether the $16 million is money that should be spent on this exercise or not.

We do hear some helicopter zooming around overhead and see them too, Judy. Unclear to us at this point whether those have anything to do with the response or whether those are news helicopters. We have yet to see any firefighters or other first responders on the scene. Imagine that will take a few more minutes.

WOODRUFF: Jeanne Meserve, while you watch this exercise unfold in Seattle and we try to figure out whether that smoke has anything to do with the explosion that we were led to believe was going to be set off, this certainly so far looks smaller than what I was led to believe was going to happen. We're going to continue to watch that -- Jeanne Meserve will continue to watch it.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com






Aired May 12, 2003 - 14:58   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
JUDY WOODRUFF, CNN ANCHOR: An imaginary dirty bomb is about to explode in Seattle, kicking off the first large-scale terrorism drill in the United States since the September 11 attacks.
Let's go live now to Seattle and to CNN's Jeanne Meserve, Jeanne.

JEANNE MESERVE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Judy, in just a few moments, we're expected the simulated detonation of a dirty bomb outside the city of Seattle. If you look behind me you see the scenario they put in place, a lot of props. You see overturned and burned-out busses, automobiles, a big pile of rubble. Within the last half hour they've been putting people in here. These are actors that playing the parts of injured people. Some have been made up with makeup. They've been put in position here.

What's the point of all of this? Michael Burns, who is an official with the Department of Homeland Security, says there is nothing like exercising to prepare first responders. He spoke as someone who is a longtime veteran of the New York City Fire Department who dealt with not one, but two attacks on the World Trade Center.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It was that preparation that took place in the towers prior to getting struck by the planes that in 45 minutes everybody got out of those buildings.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MESERVE: Judy, I'm going to stay out of this shot so hopefully we will catch the detonation of this simulated dirty bomb. Let me tell you that the point here is not just to put first responders through the paces. It's to stress the entire system from the local level to the state level, on up to the federal level. They want to find out whether their communication systems really work, whether there is sharing of information, whether there's cooperation, whether there's excessive overlap. They want to really stress things to find out where there are friction points, to find out exactly where there are gaps.

Now, there are critics who say the players know too much about this in advance. They know the dirty bomb is going off in Seattle. They know later in the week there will be an outbreak of pneumonic plague in Chicago. But the people who are running the exercise assure that there will be surprises. Things are going to the players won't know about, that we don't know about, that will really test this homeland security apparatus we have in place whether it works or whether it doesn't.

Judy, back to you.

WOODRUFF: Jeanne, how do they pick this city?

How do they pick the cities they were going to do this exercise in?

MESERVE: They wanted to pick a couple of cities where they thought there was a real threat of something happening. And Seattle has had it's share of not incidents but scares, I guess you'd say. You remember that Ahmed Ressam was arrested coming back over the border of Canada during the Y2 celebrations. He apparently was headed for the city of Los Angeles, with some an explosives to do some damage there. They've had major demonstrations here centering around the World Trade Organization, things like that.

They have hydro plants here. They nuclear plants here. They also have here a threat of real natural disaster. And everything they learn from this terrorism exercise is applicable to that. There are -- we were talking to the head of the state Emergency Preparedness Office yesterday, and he was telling us one of the things they practice for here are tsunamis because there is a risk of an offshore earthquake that puts in a big wave here. So this is intended to stress the entire system, as well as for a possible terrorist incident.

WOODRUFF: And again, Jeanne, even though they know this is coming and they have had time to prepare for, they still believe that this kind of exercise makes a difference.

MESERVE: There are smaller localized exercises that take place all around the country on fairly frequently basis. And those will test out where local departments have the right protocols in place, whether they have done all of the right sort of planing. But this exercise is only the second of this nature that involves people from the local level on up to the state to federal level. This is called top off because, this stands for top officials.

And we have some important people in Washington playing their roles. Tom Ridge, the secretary of Homeland Security is playing his part. We're told Colin Powell, the secretary of state will be playing for part of the time. Tommy Thompson, the secretary of Health and Human Services also playing a role in this. There also have been briefings with heads of other agencies and departments.

One thing that you might say is lacking in all of this is Congress. Congress has been briefed on this. Some members will be observing the -- we had one Congressional representative from Washington state participating in a press conference here today. But there's nobody really playing the part of Congress in all of this. But once again, they think this kind of exercise gives them the big picture, like nothing else would do.

WOODRUFF: And Jeanne, I think you may have mentioned this, but a lot of talk about the cost for exercises like this. What do they say about that, about how much money goes into putting on a drill like this?

MESERVE: Well, you know, you get different stories when you talk to different people. You know how that happens. But the total price tag for this is $16 million, about $2 million going to the city of Seattle, to defray costs here, another $2 million going to the city of Chicago to do the same. There obviously are expenses involved in flying in some of the federal players who were on the ground in here. We know in Chicago, they're going to be flying in portions of the pharmaceutical stockpiles, so called, push packs. That's all going to take money. So that's what the $16 million is spent for. Now I have talked to people who feel there's efficiency in this. That they have not done a lot of smaller exercises and, in fact, saved money by conducting this.

Stop for a moment, we're hearing some sort of siren going off, but we've not seen anything out there that resembles a detonation. I'm surveying the scene to see what I can see. I see dust which appears to be from vehicles, but I've not seen anything else that resembles a detonation. We'll keep watching for, that while I keep talking then.

So Some people say that $16 million is well spent. We're going to learn a lot of lessons from this. I have, however, talked to other people who deal with Homeland Security matters who feel there are better ways this money could be spent.

I am seeing smoke rising from our perspective. We see it behind the buses. Perhaps you're picking that up on one of our cameras. So apparently, the simulated dirty bomb has gone off here in Seattle. Shortly, we'll see first responders rushing to the scene here. One fire official who I spoke with yesterday said the success or failure of their performance is going to hinge on the first 15 to 25 minutes. That's where you're really going to see whether they're dealing with this appropriately. By the time we enter the second hour, they should have system in place for dealing with this. At that point, things should become methodical.

Of course, this is different than anything this fire department has dealt with before a simulated radiological attack. Radioactivity is supposed to be spewing here, which means, of course, they'll have to take different sorts of precautions in this incident than they would in a standard one.

Back to the money issue for a moment. There are people who feel that this has the potential to be a real boondoggle. They say there has to be a really careful evaluation of this exercise to make sure that we are taking a very hard and very serious look at what went wrong. You and I both hang around Washington, we know sometimes there's a tendency to want to gloss over some of the hard, cold facts, particularly when those facts have to do with failures. And so two points of view on whether the $16 million is money that should be spent on this exercise or not.

We do hear some helicopter zooming around overhead and see them too, Judy. Unclear to us at this point whether those have anything to do with the response or whether those are news helicopters. We have yet to see any firefighters or other first responders on the scene. Imagine that will take a few more minutes.

WOODRUFF: Jeanne Meserve, while you watch this exercise unfold in Seattle and we try to figure out whether that smoke has anything to do with the explosion that we were led to believe was going to be set off, this certainly so far looks smaller than what I was led to believe was going to happen. We're going to continue to watch that -- Jeanne Meserve will continue to watch it.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com