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American Morning

Airport Searches

Aired January 07, 2004 - 09:07   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: Baltimore officials at the airport there at BWI stopped and searched traffic yesterday morning for about two hours on Tuesday. Police stopped every vehicle approaching the airport.
Dennis Schrader is Maryland's homeland security director. Chief Gary McLhinney of Maryland's Transportation Authority Police with us now from the airport there.

Gentlemen, good morning to both of you, and thank you for your time here.

Mr. Schrader, what was the threat you were responding to yesterday?

DENNIS SCHRADER, MARYLAND'S HOMELAND SECURITY DIR.: There was no specific threat, but these were part of the procedures for code orange that Chief McLhinney has authorized to do, and Governor Ehrlich is very supportive of his efforts. Protecting the airport is one of the governor's top priorities, and we're doing everything that we possibly can to not be predictable in our procedures

HEMMER: So this was just a random Tuesday stop, then, is what you're suggesting?

SCHRADER: That's correct. And we're going to see a lot more of this. As the colonel will tell you in a second, he has got a variety of techniques, but we're working collaboratively. This is a team effort throughout state government. And Governor Ehrilich personally has been involved in making sure the governor is organized in a team, which is why I'm in his office and we speak frequently about these things, but he's very pleased in which what the chief is doing and being innovative and creative about the unpredictable disruptive tactics

HEMMER: Let me ask the gentlemen to your left then, Chief McLhinney, did you find anything in this search yesterday?

CHIEF GARY MCLHINNEY, MARYLAND'S TRANSPORTATION AUTHORITY POLICE: No, we did not find anything. Our officers have been out here 24 hours a day, seven days a week since the latest activation of code orange, doing random checks. And yesterday, we did do 100 percent checks for approximately two hours.

HEMMER: Chief, how did people respond to this?

MCLHINNEY: Very supportive. The public has been terrific. They understand. They appreciate the efforts of our officers, being out there. And they've been very supportive and very understanding.

HEMMER: Mr. Schrader, I understand you're the only airport in the country that only fingerprints people coming into the U.S., but also those leaving are subjected to fingerprints as well. Why is that process being done at BWI?

SCHRADER: Well, it's part of a pilot. As you know, the U.S. Visit program is now in 115 airports across the country, doing it for inbound. They're piloting us for the exit. And it's important, because from a technology perspective, we have 400,000 people that come through our border annually by air, and it's almost impossible, both here and nationally, to be able to correlate all that data manually. So the important part of this is developing these technological techniques to figure out who's coming and going. So the exit process is very important. The governor is delighted to be a pilot for this ground breaking work nationally.

HEMMER: So if you're the pilot program in Baltimore, do you anticipate it to continue, or will this stop at some point?

SCHRADER: It's supposed to go on through this year, and be the pilot program for the -- to work out the bugs, and once that's done, it would be distributed nationally.

HEMMER: I thank you for your time, gentleman. Dennis Schrader, there, Chief Gary McLhinney there at BWI, Baltimore-Washington International airport. Security measures yesterday and Tuesday raising a lot of eyebrows there. Nothing doing, though. Thanks.

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 January 7, 2004 - 09:07   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
BILL HEMMER, CNN ANCHOR: Baltimore officials at the airport there at BWI stopped and searched traffic yesterday morning for about two hours on Tuesday. Police stopped every vehicle approaching the airport.
Dennis Schrader is Maryland's homeland security director. Chief Gary McLhinney of Maryland's Transportation Authority Police with us now from the airport there.

Gentlemen, good morning to both of you, and thank you for your time here.

Mr. Schrader, what was the threat you were responding to yesterday?

DENNIS SCHRADER, MARYLAND'S HOMELAND SECURITY DIR.: There was no specific threat, but these were part of the procedures for code orange that Chief McLhinney has authorized to do, and Governor Ehrlich is very supportive of his efforts. Protecting the airport is one of the governor's top priorities, and we're doing everything that we possibly can to not be predictable in our procedures

HEMMER: So this was just a random Tuesday stop, then, is what you're suggesting?

SCHRADER: That's correct. And we're going to see a lot more of this. As the colonel will tell you in a second, he has got a variety of techniques, but we're working collaboratively. This is a team effort throughout state government. And Governor Ehrilich personally has been involved in making sure the governor is organized in a team, which is why I'm in his office and we speak frequently about these things, but he's very pleased in which what the chief is doing and being innovative and creative about the unpredictable disruptive tactics

HEMMER: Let me ask the gentlemen to your left then, Chief McLhinney, did you find anything in this search yesterday?

CHIEF GARY MCLHINNEY, MARYLAND'S TRANSPORTATION AUTHORITY POLICE: No, we did not find anything. Our officers have been out here 24 hours a day, seven days a week since the latest activation of code orange, doing random checks. And yesterday, we did do 100 percent checks for approximately two hours.

HEMMER: Chief, how did people respond to this?

MCLHINNEY: Very supportive. The public has been terrific. They understand. They appreciate the efforts of our officers, being out there. And they've been very supportive and very understanding.

HEMMER: Mr. Schrader, I understand you're the only airport in the country that only fingerprints people coming into the U.S., but also those leaving are subjected to fingerprints as well. Why is that process being done at BWI?

SCHRADER: Well, it's part of a pilot. As you know, the U.S. Visit program is now in 115 airports across the country, doing it for inbound. They're piloting us for the exit. And it's important, because from a technology perspective, we have 400,000 people that come through our border annually by air, and it's almost impossible, both here and nationally, to be able to correlate all that data manually. So the important part of this is developing these technological techniques to figure out who's coming and going. So the exit process is very important. The governor is delighted to be a pilot for this ground breaking work nationally.

HEMMER: So if you're the pilot program in Baltimore, do you anticipate it to continue, or will this stop at some point?

SCHRADER: It's supposed to go on through this year, and be the pilot program for the -- to work out the bugs, and once that's done, it would be distributed nationally.

HEMMER: I thank you for your time, gentleman. Dennis Schrader, there, Chief Gary McLhinney there at BWI, Baltimore-Washington International airport. Security measures yesterday and Tuesday raising a lot of eyebrows there. Nothing doing, though. Thanks.

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