Return to Transcripts main page

American Morning

Security on Small Airlines; NYPD Brings In Former CIA Agent

Aired January 28, 2002 - 08:40   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.
JACK CAFFERTY, CNN FINANCIAL ANCHOR: There are new questions this morning about safety aboard some of the nation's commuter airlines. Flight attendants say several of the smaller airlines are requiring them to conduct preflight cabin security searches without providing the necessary time or training to do so.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We have not been trained. They say anything out of the ordinary, but what is that?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We're not trained for it. This is not really in our job description.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We were not given any extra time to do a security sweep, but we're still pressured to meet an on time departure.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CAFFERTY: Joining us now from Washington, D.C., Patricia Friend, president of the Association of Flight Attendants and from Atlanta, Robin Gurganious, a flight attendant with Atlantic Southeast Airlines.

Welcome to both of you.

Patricia, let me begin with you. I want to read you something here, a statement that was put out concerning Delta's commuter airline ASA -- Delta Connection ASA.

"After September the 11th, the Federal Aviation Administration mandated thorough searches of the cabin for suspicious materials on board aircraft. Flight attendants at Delta Connection ASA are assigned to conduct the searches, but we have not been provided any additional time or training to conduct them effectively. At some airlines, flight attendants are pressured by threat of discipline to abbreviate the searches so that the airline can have an on time departure."

All of which leads me to, I guess the first question is, if I'm flying one of these little airlines, is it safe?

PATRICIA FRIEND, ASSOCIATION OF FLIGHT ATTENDANTS: Well, we certainly believe that -- that we and you deserve every aircraft to have a thorough security search, and the conditions that exist at some of our regionals, Atlantic Southeast, which is a Delta connection, Air Wisconsin, the U.S. Airways express carriers, do not give us either the training or the time to ensure that that aircraft has been thoroughly searched for any suspicious objects.

CAFFERTY: So the answer to my question is, are they safe? And what is the answer? Based on what you're suggesting, which is there is not enough time to do these security searches. Does that represent a risk to the flying public?

FRIEND: Well, we believe, in fact, it does represent a risk. We issued a security alert last week when we reached the end, essentially, of our efforts to persuade the people who manage these companies that something needed to be done if we were all to feel absolutely safe and secure on these regional carriers.

CAFFERTY: Let me run something else by you here -- the president of the Regional Airline Association says, "the necessary training for these searches has been provided to flight attendants, and is monitored for compliance by the FAA. Further, regional airlines provide the necessary time in their flight schedules to properly accomplish the direct aircraft cabin search as called for in the FAA Security Directives."

The gist of this is there is enough time built into the schedule to do this job properly. Is it simply that the flight attendants don't want to either be charged with the responsibility for this, or have to do the extra work?

FRIEND: Well, in fact, no additional boarding time or additional time on the aircraft has been added at any of these carriers, and all of the duties we had on board that aircraft on the ground, before September 11th, are still the same. We get reports regularly from flight attendants who are pressured by the ground personnel to abbreviate the security searches in order to make an ontime departure. So that statement is essentially inaccurate.

I would further add that the FAA has no guidelines or criteria for the training for security searches. And, in fact, at some of our airlines, at AirTran for example, and Horizon, where they have -- they're working with us to provide the training and time, they ask us to draft training guidelines since none exist.

CAFFERTY: All right, let me bring Robin Gurganious into this. She is a flight attendant, flies every day for Atlantic Southeast Airlines. One of your colleagues, Robin, suggested that she didn't feel that she was qualified to do this, that the responsibility didn't belong with her, rather it should be some sort of a trained individual, should be charged with doing this.

Let me ask the same question to you that I asked to Patricia a minute ago. How concerned should I be, as a fare paying passenger on one of these smaller airlines, about my safety?

ROBIN GURGANIOUS, FLIGHT ATTENDANT: Well, I do these searches just about weekly, when I do fly, and I guarantee you, if you're on my airplane, it's a safe aircraft.

You may be about 20 or 30 minutes late leaving the gate, but you're going to be safe, and what you have to understand is we're not going to let an aircraft leave a gate unsafe because of pressure, but it does put a damper on your connection schedule.

CAFFERTY: What's the bottom line on this debate? At the end of the day, what's this really about, and what ought to be done to fix it?

GURGANIOUS: There's a couple of solutions. Number one, you give the flight attendant additional time to do these searches and some training, which we have not received. Or, you have ground personnel that are already at the airport, that are just as familiar with those aircraft as we are, to do these searches.

CAFFERTY: Is this a work rules issue, where management, perhaps, is perceived by the flight attendants as trying to off-load additional duties onto the flight attendants with no attention towards additional compensation, training, benefits, et cetera?

GURGANIOUS: That's one issue, but it's not the main issue. The main issue is we have a job to do on that aircraft, and that's to keep the passengers safe. If we're not given enough time or additional time to do the searches, then you're -- the passenger is going to pay the price because unfortunately, we can't get an aircraft out on time.

CAFFERTY: Right, and I'm comforted by this. I just want to go back. You do insist that before the plane leaves, if you're on it, the search is thorough, it's complete, and you're satisfied before it pulls away from the gate that it's safe to go, right?

GURGANIOUS: Yes, sir, but you're not going to be going on time.

CAFFERTY: Fair enough. I want to thank both of you women for joining us here this morning. Patricia Friend is the president of the Association of Flight Attendants, joining us from Washington. And Robin Gurganious, who is a flight attendant with Atlantic Southeast Airlines, thank you both for being on "American Morning." Appreciate it.

GURGANIOUS: Thank you.

FRIEND: Thank you.

CAFFERTY: Paula.

PAULA ZAHN, CNN ANCHOR: Every Monday at about this time, CNN National Security Correspondent David Ensor joins us for a weekly intelligence brief. This morning, Homeland Security is creating some local employment opportunities for the intelligence community, and David Ensor joins us now from Washington.

Thanks for joining us, David, as always. Let's talk a little bit about the significant of what has happened in the New York Police Department. A man named David Cohen, a man who has spent some 25 years in the CIA as a high level operative joining the force. What for?

DAVID ENSOR, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: Well, it's a sign of the times, I think, Paula, post September 11th, that the NYPD feels it necessary to have a deputy commissioner who spent, as you say, his career in the CIA, running spies. And this man, David Cohen, you see him here being sworn in, will now be attempting, if possible, to arrange for the infiltration of terrorist cells in New York, just as the police department has in the past infiltrated the Mafia or drug gangs.

It's a sign of the times that they need a man with this kind of background in the New York Police Department at this point. And it is a time, also, when we've just had a couple of laws passed that changed the amount of information that the CIA can get.

On the other hand, going the other direction, from domestic law enforcement. That is a somewhat controversial change. Most Americans supported the idea that U.S. intelligence needs to be able to get more information, any kind of information, to stop terrorists, but there are privacy and civil liberties concerns as well.

ZAHN: Let's go through some of what the CIA now has broader leverage to do. So they have broader wiretapping authority, right? And more access to grand jury testimony? Those are the two chief issues?

ENSOR: That's right. On wiretapping, the CIA can now get access to wiretaps done by law enforcement through something called the FISA Accord, Federal Intelligence Surveillance Act Accord, they can get permission to see wiretaps which are done of American citizens or foreigners in this country, and the rules under which the FBI and other law enforcement personnel can do those wiretaps have been loosened up, too.

So, Americans have sacrificed some of their privacy and their civil liberties in order to try and help both law enforcement in this country, and the CIA and U.S. intelligence around the world do a better job.

What the concern is, though, that these could get into the wrong hands. Take the grand jury example that you just mentioned. The CIA can now ask for access to grand jury secret testimony gathered for law enforcement purposes.

The civil libertarians are concerned that if the CIA gets access to that -- for example, say you're an American, and you rent an apartment to somebody, and it later turns out that person was either terrorist or the friend of a terrorist, your name and information about you ends up in the grand jury testimony.

If the CIA gets that, and then perhaps shares it with other intelligence services around the world, you could end up having problems, shall we say, when you travel. The same thing goes for the wiretaps.

So, there is a sacrifice, a potential danger there could be either abuses or just simply mistakes made that could really create problems for Americans or foreigners who live in this country.

The trade-off, for the moment, most persons will support the trade-off, but if those problems come up in the future, civil libertarians say the pendulum could swing the other way. And the intelligence community is asking for some additional powers from Congress to be able to get even more easily at wiretaps. So, there is likely to be controversy in this in the coming years.

ZAHN: To put it lightly. I also think it's really fascinating to follow this David Cohen, and we'll be counting on you to sort of track him and to see what kind of resources he'll have available to use all this CIA experience to clamp down on what are believed to be potential secret cells here, stateside.

David Ensor, as always, thanks for the briefing. We appreciate 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