"Richmond, Va., Airport Workers Maintain Surveillance over Crowds"

Saturday, September 6, 2003

Richmond, Va., Airport Workers Maintain Surveillance over Crowds
The Richmond (VA) Times-Dispatch


If you think you're being watched at the airport, you probably are.

Deep in the bowels of Richmond International Airport, communications
officers scan a bank of monitors that show passengers entering the terminal,
riding up the escalator, passing through screening stations and hurrying off
to flights.

By turning a joystick, the officers can zoom in more than 50 cameras and get
a closer look at any public area inside or outside the airport. This
includes runways, jetways, and entry gates to the secure area behind the
terminal.

What's the most outrageous thing they've ever seen? "Use your imagination on
that one," said communications officer Shelley Harrell.

Fellow officer Joel Kursel said he enjoys witnessing the smiles and hugs of
families greeting each other in the atrium.

Viewing passenger traffic is only a small part of the activities at the
revamped communications center. Officers provide round-the-clock scrutiny of
the airport, from aircraft landings to doors left ajar.

New technology includes a paging system and controls of the facility's
energy management.

"We also can look out for lines" forming in the screening area, noted Jon
Mathiasen, airport president and CEO.

Without fanfare this summer, Mathiasen ordered the communications center
moved from its long-time location atop the fire and rescue building.

The move cost between $75,000 and $100,000, he said, mostly to pay for a new
heating and air conditioning system, and for energy management and paging
technology.

During the past year, the airport also has consolidated its police offices
into first-floor space adjacent to the communications center.

Police, security and communications personnel now use offices and board
rooms that housed the executive offices of the Capital Region Airport
Commission. (Those offices were moved several years ago into the Massey
Building next to the Virginia Aviation Museum).

"After 9/11, the police at the airport took on a new emphasis," Mathiasen
said. "Police never had a permanent home."

Now the 31-officer department has a squad room equipped with a large-screen
TV, computers and work spaces. A locker room and kitchen are added
amenities.

Security chief Victor Williams, a 20-year veteran of the force, said the
police used to have "hand-me-down" space at Richmond International. "This is
the first time in 20 years we really have new space," he said.

The digs are hardly opulent, though, with used chairs and desks. The
department spent less than $10,000 on the furniture, using money from the
airport's share of assets seized by a regional drug interdiction team,
according to Williams.

Another $10,000 was spent on computers, he said.

In addition, a federal grant was used to pay for a $36,000 digital
fingerprint machine.

The new digital technology is "part of the heightened level of security" at
the airport, providing quicker and more reliable fingerprint checks,
Mathiasen said.

Former airport police chief Larry Covington now serves as airport security
coordinator. Checking badge credentials for anyone working at the airport
became a full-time job after 9/11.

Covington said he has done 1,300 fingerprint checks during the past two
years, with only a handful of applicants rejected by CRAC because of felony
convictions. (Numbers weren't available for any applicants rejected for
airline jobs; those records are kept by the individual airlines, Covington
said.)

The new "live scan" fingerprint machine sends digital images to the FBI's
database. He usually learns within 48 hours whether or not the prints raise
any red flags, Covington said.

If the new communications center has a downside, it could be its proximity
to jets at nearby boarding gates.

Mathiasen said the new air-conditioning system is more than adequate to suck
up any residual fumes.

Asked if the communicators could smell the jets, Kursel shrugged and said,
"I'm used to being around planes."


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