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American Morning

Federal Authorities Investigating Security Breach at O'Hare; Pentagon Disputes Reports of Helicopter Crash

Aired November 06, 2001 - 10:00   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.
BILL HEMMER, CNN ANCHOR: In Chicago, Federal authorities are investigating what they call a major security breach at O'Hare International Airport.

Our bureau chief there in Chicago, Jeff Flock, now with an update this morning.

A lot of questions we mentioned, Jeff. What's happening now?

JEFF FLOCK, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, hello to you, Bill.

We are out here at O'Hare. This is where of course it took place. And I'll you, since we were on earlier this morning, maybe you can see over my shoulders, one of the checkpoints has been shut down. Maybe you can see the sort of curtain that kind of came down over there in the foreground. You can see what happens when do you something like that. The idea is to force people through fewer number of checkpoints to keep the focus on a smaller area. But if Rick is able to look off to the left here, you can see this line of people that backs up when you don't have as many checkpoints open. So that's a factor out here, too.

Whatever happened, though, over the weekend, everyone agrees, though, it was not good. It was a breakdown in security. A 27-year- old man from Nepal, getting through security with seven knives as it turns out, and a stun gun. Trying to get some sense this morning, Bill, from the traveling public and people that spend a lot of time in the air on their take on this, and their level of safety this morning.

I've got Diana Rushing, who is the president of Association of Flight Attendants.

You represent a lot of people that spend a lot of time in the air. Does this surprise you what took place.

DIANNA RUSHING, PRESIDENT, ASSOC. OF FLIGHT ATTENDANTS: No, it doesn't surprise me. It disappoints me, but it does not surprise.

FLOCK: Why does it not surprise you?

RUSHING: Nothing has really changed; the training, the personnel at our security checkpoints have not changed. FLOCK: Now this man, obviously, according to the FBI not a terrorist, but seven knives an a stun gun. How can you explain that getting through the security checkpoint and an X-ray machine?

RUSHING: I can't explain it. If people had been vigilant, had been doing I believe their jobs, it would have not happened.

FLOCK: The answer, have you got one?

RUSHING: It's rather complicated. Obviously personnel is going to have to change, supervised, trained extensively. There's going to have to be a lot of changes made.

FLOCK: Is it as simple as put the federal government in charge of, or is it a more complex answer?

RUSHING: The association of flight attendants is advocating federalization of the security screeners. Is it the entire answer? Absolutely not. We need to have a total revamping of the entire program.

FLOCK: As we look now, we've got another camera placed to look over at that security checkpoint area, what's the problem there, in a nutshell?

RUSHING: It's a long, long -- this isn't...

FLOCK: Give me the headline?

RUSHING: Yes, the headline. It is a problem that this has not been taken seriously for many, many years. And now we are at a crunch time, that obviously this has to be taken extremely seriously. Our legislators are going to have to act, and they're act now to change the entire process here.

FLOCK: Obviously, we have already changed procedures. We look outside. We have a camera looking at the procedure coming up,not as many cars. That seems to be safer area out there. Obviously fewer checkpoints it seems in here. Despite that, you get seven knives through security.

RUSHING: The security people that are in charge here are going to have to explain how that happened, and we pray it never happens again, and that changes are made it make our skies safe and to have the security at the level it should be at already.

FLOCK: And lastly, before we get away, we want it point out, we talked to people who said the system did work actually. This man was at some point caught, and he was caught by one of your colleagues, one of your fellow employee owners of United Airlines, because you are a United flight attendant. What about that?

RUSHING: Thank goodness our personnel were really on the ball, and did a random check at the gate and was able to apprehend the gentleman.

FLOCK: Do you feel safe getting into the air these days?

RUSHING: Airline travel is the safest mode of transportation. I feel as safe as I did prior to September 11th. Should it be better? Absolutely, at this point.

FLOCK: Coming through O'Hare on this checkpoint that stands right behind us here?

RUSHING: I do, in the long-term, to make the skies safe, there is a lot of changes that need to be made. We need to be extremely vigilant. People are a little more vigilant now, but that's really the only changes that have been made.

FLOCK: Diana Rushing, president of the Association of Flight Attendants. Appreciate your time this morning and your perspective. We of course will continue to look at it here and try answer the question, what went wrong?

That's the latest from O'Hare, Bill. Back to you.

HEMMER: Jeff, a couple quick questions here. They say he had no connection to terrorism. Do they know why he had nine knives, and possibly more, getting on that airplane?

FLOCK: He gave a couple explanations in court yesterday, one that he collects knives, two, he was keeping them for his own personal protection, and apparently was unaware of any prohibition of carrying knives on the aircraft.

HEMMER: Got it. And with regard to the security workers there, we had heard yesterday they were fired, later heard they were suspended. What is their status right now? Will they be back at work?

RUSHING: Yes, speaker Hastert said yesterday that he was glad that they weren't government employees, because they would have been harder to fire, but in fact, as you know, private employees are difficult to fire as well, and in fact they have only been suspended. It is a total of eight people, seven of the screeners and one of their supervisors.

Got it. OK, Jeff Flock there at O'Hare in Chicago.

Jeff, thanks.

Several measures being considered to shore up airport security. We talked about a few of them just then, and one of the things that is being looked at is the issue of bag matching.

For more on that, Kathleen Koch has a look today.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

KATHLEEN KOCH, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Each year a billion bags are checked into the cargo holds of U.S. aircraft. But bag matching, making sure that the passengers is on the same plane is required only on international flights, that to foil terrorists, like those who planted a bomb on Pan Am flight 103 and then got off before it exploded.

Paul Hudson lost his daughter aboard that flight.

PAUL HUDSON, AVIATION CONSUMER ACTION PROJECT: Positive bag matching is one of the two best defenses we have against aviation bombings. And aviation bombings remains the second most deadly form of terrorism.

KOCH: U.S. airlines have opposed bag matching on domestic flights, arguing that unloading luggage if a passenger didn't board would cause lengthy delays. But now the Federal Aviation Administration is for the first time seriously considering requiring bag matching.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: There are discussions under way about how we would operationally make that happen. Again, I think we have to move in those directions.

An FAA-funded study in 1987 found bag matching would delay 14 percent of domestic flights by an average of seven minutes. It was estimated that implementing 100 percent bag matching would cost airlines about 40 cents per passengers. The aviation industry insists that studies though that one out of 81 passengers doesn't board after checking a bag, missing a connection for example. Bag matching is an expensive precaution that would not stop suicide terrorists.

CAROL HALLETT, AIR TRANSPORT ASSOCIATION: There is zero secure it to having 100 percent bag match. It would be really tragic to make the American people think they were safe because we were doing 100 percent bag match, when in fact it will do nothing to identify a threat.

KOCH: Now bags on domestic flights are matched only when a passenger is flagged as a potential risk by the profiling system, and there no explosive detection machine to examine their luggage.

(on camera): Those who oppose bag matching may soon have no choice. The House aviation security bill requires until all checked bags can be screened, while the Senate measures indicates improved bag matching.

Kathleen Koch, CNN, Washington.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

(NEWS UPDATES)

HEMMER: I want to update you now on a story we've been following throughout the morning. Provincial government sources in southwestern Pakistan say a helicopter crash in southwestern Pakistan on Sunday night. Some of the officials say it was a U.S. helicopter. A Pentagon official claims to know nothing about the alleged incident. If it were true, the source says -- quote -- we almost certainly would, perhaps more on that a bit later when the briefing gets under way.

For the Pentagon this morning, let's check in there with CNN's Bob Franken, who is watching that.

Anything more on this first, Bob?

BOB FRANKEN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: As a matter of fact, yes, Bill. Now Pentagon officials are saying that is not true. "That is a quote." Another quote, "There was no helicopters crash." Privately, Pentagon officials are critical of reports that are based on what they call reports from questionable sources on the ground in Pakistan. They are saying that there are rigid procedures for reporting an incident like this that occurs. The reports would have happened about an hour, they say, after the incident had occurred. And then a day and a half later, they had been heard anything from the ground to indicate that there was a helicopter crash.

They think that there might be some confusion based on their acknowledgement on Friday. In Afghanistan, a military chopper did go down, because weather forced it down, and four were injured in that one, and had to be pulled out by another helicopters. So that's the latest on that.

As for the continuing war effort, the story is the same today as it is just about everyday: intensive bombing, intensified bombing in just about all areas of Afghanistan. You can see the skies are lit up again, the night camera video showing that the -- there is ground fire aimed at the planes, which are firing missiles in return, bombing positions, sometimes with very heavy duty bombs now, going after Taliban. The officials are very happy. They say they improved accuracy, because of the introduction of U.S. ground forces, special operations people, about a couple dozen of them. They're so happy, says the defense secretary, that they are going to put more in. Rumsfeld spoke to reporters as he was returning from his trip to the region.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD RUMSFELD, DEFENSE SECRETARY: Clearly, the targeting is improving. There is just no question about it. When you are doing it without contact with forces on the ground, and you compare that with doing it with precision weapons and people on the ground who can give you precise coordinates, you just have an enormous advantages, and the battle damage reports indicate that.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

FRANKEN: Back in the United States, Bill, he will be briefing in about an hour and 45 minutes. One other thing to remember, they closed the Pentagon post office yesterday, because of concerns about finding some anthrax spores. They have run exhaustive tests since then, have found nothing else since they cleaned up the area.

However, that post office remains closed -- Bill.

HEMMER: We will take that news. That is good news. Bob, Thanks. Bob Franken from the Pentagon.

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