Return to Transcripts main page
CNN Live Sunday
Interview With Peter Goelz
Aired September 28, 2003 - 10:44 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.
SEAN CALLEBS, CNN ANCHOR: We take a look at homeland security now and the safety of our skies. After September 11 the federal government ordered more airport screeners and made them federal employees. Now the government reportedly needs to cut several thousand screeners because of budget constraints. That was to happen this coming Tuesday, but the date has now been pushed back.
Here to help put all this into perspective, is Peter Goelz.
And Peter, I pronounced that name correctly?
PETER GOELZ, FMR MANAGING DIR., NTSB: You did, indeed.
CALLEBS: OK, the former managing director of the National Transportation Safety Board.
Thanks for coming.
This GAO report waives a lot of red flags out there. Firstly, a lot of concern that the government simply threw money at a problem. All right, let's get TSA security screeners and get them out there now and hired as many as 6,000, too many? Did that happen?
GOELZ: There's no question that TSA has had a rough couple of weeks. And that their first year and a half of operations has also been troubled.
At one point they did have over 50,000 screeners hired, close to 55,000. They've been laying off and they are going to be laying off some of the fulltime screeners. At is same time they're recruiting part-time screeners, because at a number of the major airports particularly LAX, Los Angeles, they've not had enough screeners on at key times.
CALLEBS: Peter, I guess if they hired a lot of folks and they could point to, yes, security is a lot better, maybe people wouldn't be so curious about what happened. But the GAO report says that the screeners aren't even being evaluated as closely as they were prior to September 11th. What does that tell you?
GOELZ: The GAO report was very troubling. And much of it was, in fact, confidential. We haven't seen the full report.
But what it shows is that the real emphasis for TSA has got to be on better technology. And probably the most troubling aspect of their budget is that they cut almost $75 million from research for the next generation technology. That's the challenge. They've got to get better technology.
CALLEBS: Let's explain to viewers exactly why that is important. Because they did do a test and they found that a number of box cutters were getting through all this supposedly high tech -- and I think if you mention box cutter, security checkpoint, it just sends a shiver down people's spines.
GOELZ: Absolutely. You can still get stuff through security. Now, that's not to say that once it's true that all trouble is going to arise. It is a layered approach. The cockpit doors are secured. There are more armed marshals on the flights.
And probably, most importantly, the passengers now are never going to allow what happened in 9/11 to take place again without intervention.
CALLEBS: But I think the overall feeling is it should never get to that point again.
Peter, we could talk to you all day about this. We want to talk about why a lot of airports want to return to having their own private security. We'll have to do that another time, though.
Peter Goelz, former managing director of the NTSB. Thank you for joining us today.
GOELZ: Thank you.
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 September 28, 2003 - 10:44 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
SEAN CALLEBS, CNN ANCHOR: We take a look at homeland security now and the safety of our skies. After September 11 the federal government ordered more airport screeners and made them federal employees. Now the government reportedly needs to cut several thousand screeners because of budget constraints. That was to happen this coming Tuesday, but the date has now been pushed back.
Here to help put all this into perspective, is Peter Goelz.
And Peter, I pronounced that name correctly?
PETER GOELZ, FMR MANAGING DIR., NTSB: You did, indeed.
CALLEBS: OK, the former managing director of the National Transportation Safety Board.
Thanks for coming.
This GAO report waives a lot of red flags out there. Firstly, a lot of concern that the government simply threw money at a problem. All right, let's get TSA security screeners and get them out there now and hired as many as 6,000, too many? Did that happen?
GOELZ: There's no question that TSA has had a rough couple of weeks. And that their first year and a half of operations has also been troubled.
At one point they did have over 50,000 screeners hired, close to 55,000. They've been laying off and they are going to be laying off some of the fulltime screeners. At is same time they're recruiting part-time screeners, because at a number of the major airports particularly LAX, Los Angeles, they've not had enough screeners on at key times.
CALLEBS: Peter, I guess if they hired a lot of folks and they could point to, yes, security is a lot better, maybe people wouldn't be so curious about what happened. But the GAO report says that the screeners aren't even being evaluated as closely as they were prior to September 11th. What does that tell you?
GOELZ: The GAO report was very troubling. And much of it was, in fact, confidential. We haven't seen the full report.
But what it shows is that the real emphasis for TSA has got to be on better technology. And probably the most troubling aspect of their budget is that they cut almost $75 million from research for the next generation technology. That's the challenge. They've got to get better technology.
CALLEBS: Let's explain to viewers exactly why that is important. Because they did do a test and they found that a number of box cutters were getting through all this supposedly high tech -- and I think if you mention box cutter, security checkpoint, it just sends a shiver down people's spines.
GOELZ: Absolutely. You can still get stuff through security. Now, that's not to say that once it's true that all trouble is going to arise. It is a layered approach. The cockpit doors are secured. There are more armed marshals on the flights.
And probably, most importantly, the passengers now are never going to allow what happened in 9/11 to take place again without intervention.
CALLEBS: But I think the overall feeling is it should never get to that point again.
Peter, we could talk to you all day about this. We want to talk about why a lot of airports want to return to having their own private security. We'll have to do that another time, though.
Peter Goelz, former managing director of the NTSB. Thank you for joining us today.
GOELZ: Thank you.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
