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American Morning

Interview of Bernard Kerik

Aired March 11, 2002 - 08:31   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.
PAULA ZAHN, CNN ANCHOR: And we are back at 31 minutes after the hour. Dramatic memorials will mark this day, while at the World Trade Center site, the cleanup and the search goes on. The body of Sergeant Michael Curtin was one of two police officers recovered from the ruins just last week, and Curtin's wife and daughter asked to be there when his body was removed, and they were on hand, leading the procession as a police honor guard carried his flag-draped body away from ground zero.

At the moment of that first crash, the names of the 23 members of New York's finest who lost their lives on September 11th will be read aloud at every precinct house in New York City.

He was a key member of New York's crisis management team, and the events of September 11th made him a national hero too. Police Commissioner Bernard Kerik was a tower of strength in the face of disaster, standing shoulder to shoulder with New York's mayor, and risking his own life in the process. And the now former police commissioner, Bernard Kerik, joins me now right here on the rooftop.

Good morning, good to see you, again, sir.

BERNARD KERIK, FORMER POLICE COMMISSIONER, NEW YORK CITY: Good morning, Paula.

ZAHN: What is the most vimid (ph) -- vivid lasting image you have of September 11th?

KERIK: I think the most vivid image is the -- is when I first arrived at the buildings, watching the people jump from the buildings, the feeling of helplessness. You know, when you're in this line of work for many, many years, you have a lot of power to help people. That was one thing scene you couldn't really help anyone in. That's something that I think I'll never forget.

ZAHN: And in spite of the fact that it was your job, not only to give orders, but to try to remain calm, I understand a number of firefighters going into the buildings were actually making last confessions before they went in, acknowledging the magnitude of what they were going to be exposed to.

KERIK: I think if you look at the press accounts, if you look at the visuals of 9/11, everybody that responded to that scene, there's a picture of Officer Leahy (ph), a cop that responded to the scene, and there's a number of accounts in one of the tabloids, the "Daily News," I think, where he constantly looked up at the buildings while he was helping people. He continued to look up. Everybody that responded that day knew the dangers, knew what could happen, and many of them lost their lives as a result of the buildings falling. But they knew, they knew the danger they were in, and they still continued to do their job.

ZAHN: The command center that you and the mayor worked out of was destroyed at one point. How close did either one of you come to getting killed?

KERIK: We had -- we had some close calls that day on West Street. We were there with Commissioner Feehan and Chief Ganci. We left, I guess, we missed the tower falling by about 12 or 13 minutes. We wound up inside 75 Barkley (ph), where we were trapped. We had some close calls, but, you know, there are a number of people that just didn't get out of there, that didn't make it out.

ZAHN: I know we had the former fire commissioner on this morning that was talking about the difficulties they had with radios. Do you think that that was a large reason why so many firefighters and police department officials lost their lives?

KERIK: Well, I don't know if it was that, or it was -- you know, they were in the wrong place at the wrong time, or a number of them couldn't get out of the buildings, they were on the stairwells. New York City was probably better prepared for a catastrophe than any city in the world. But this was the unimaginable, the radio -- the loss of radios, the loss of communications, the cell sites that were on the towers and some of the surrounding buildings, we lost an enormous amount of communications, but this was an act that nobody ever expected. And I think, under the circumstances, I think the men and women of the fire department and police department did extremely well.

ZAHN: How much prepared do you believe New York City is today to withstand, maybe not an identical terrorist attack, but another vicious terrorist attack?

KERIK: Well, I think we're much more educated today and much more knowledgeable, and we learned a number of things from that day that we didn't know. But I think this is going to be a learning process, and it is going to go on for a long time. You know, people in Europe and the Arab nations, and Israel, they've been dealing with terrorism for many, many years as a home base, where we have not. And we now have to learn how to do that. And most importantly, we can't forget what happened on September 11th. Because when we do, it may happen again. We've got to get hypervigilent. We can't get complacent. We have got to remember, keep fighting this war against terrorism.

ZAHN: You have a brand new life now, outside of police department work. You actually are associated with Mayor Giuliani now.

KERIK: I'm associated with Giuliani Partners. I created my own investigative firm, and I'm adjusting to civilian life. ZAHN: And I'm sure, like you said, today is one of those days that you'll never be able to erase from your mind, the sixth-month marker, the year marker, even though time marches on.

KERIK: It's not even about six months, or a year, two years or five. I think every day, for the people that you were there, you think about -- you think something about that day every single day. It never goes away, ever.

ZAHN: Thank you for joining us with your thoughts and your reflections this morning. Good luck to you. Sorry about those mittens, I borrowed them.

KERIK: They're warm.

ZAHN: Pretty big, aren't they? Take care, Bernard Kerik, the former New York City police commissioner.

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