[Congressional Record Volume 147, Number 156 (Tuesday, November 13, 2001)]
[Senate]
[Pages S11673-S11674]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                            AIRLINE SECURITY

  Mr. NELSON of Florida. Madam President, I call to the Senate's 
attention the fact that the travel and tourism industry is a most 
important industry to all of our States but especially to 30 of our 
States. The travel and tourism industry is one of the top three 
industries in those States. As a result, we see that the reluctance of 
people to travel, particularly on airliners, is having a devastating 
economic effect upon areas of the country that are magnets for travel 
and tourism.
  Clearly, two such areas are in my State: Orlando, which is the No. 1 
tourist destination in the world, and Miami, a central hub of travel 
and tourism throughout the Americas and of a huge cruise ship business 
to which passengers come by airliner. But you can look at other cities 
in the country--Atlanta, New York, Las Vegas--you could go to any 
number of the cities where travel and tourism is a major economic 
component, and they are devastated.
  For example, in Orlando it is very interesting; you see the dramatic 
effects of people afraid to be on airplanes and thus the reduced 
airliner traffic. You can go into downtown Orlando, in hotels that are 
more accommodating to business travel, and you will find that they are 
doing fairly well. But if you go out on International Drive, outside of 
Orlando, toward the tourist destinations, you will find hotels that 
have less than 50-percent occupancy.

  Indeed, I talked to the owner of one hotel--it is a hotel with 800 
rooms--and

[[Page S11674]]

they have closed up 600 of the 800 rooms. It does not take too long to 
understand, with that kind of reduced revenue, suddenly, the owners of 
those hotels are not going to be able to pay their mortgages, their 
taxes.
  Look at the devastating effects upon employment in the areas where 
they have laid off so many workers because they do not have the traffic 
to support all of the employees, and you see how that diminished 
economic activity ripples through the economy and starts to devastate 
not only a community but devastates a State. And when you look at the 
reduction in the sales tax in so many of our States, and the crisis 
State governments are now facing in their budgets, indeed, you see that 
it starts to economically devastate the Nation.
  Why am I saying all this? I am saying it because we have something we 
can do about it in this Chamber and in the other Chamber at the other 
end of the Capitol, because we have in front of us a bill for 
establishing airline security, with all of these items on which we have 
generally gotten consensus such as sky marshals, such as reinforced 
cockpit doors, such as hijack training for airline employees. But we 
come to this difference of opinion on the screeners, the airport 
security personnel: Should they be privately contracted or should they 
be federalized law enforcement officers?
  The reason I rise to make these remarks is because I just heard a 
riveting story by Senator Debbie Stabenow of Michigan. On a flight 
inbound to Reagan National Airport last night, a passenger, perhaps 
intoxicated, stood up and started walking toward the cockpit.
  Now, mind you, the FAA has a regulation that for the last 30 minutes 
of a flight inbound into Reagan National Airport every passenger must 
remain seated. It is for the obvious reasons, with Reagan National 
Airport being so close to the centers of Government--10 seconds from 
the Pentagon, 20 seconds from the White House, and 30 seconds of a 
diverted flight path to the U.S. Capitol--that this was one of the 
safety precautions the FAA required on inbound and outbound aircraft at 
Reagan National Airport.
  As relayed by Senator Stabenow, they were inbound, and suddenly this 
rather large gentleman got up and started walking toward the cockpit. 
What she shared with us was, she was so proud of the professionalism 
that then occurred, with two sky marshals sitting in first class who 
immediately got up, without any fuss, and got this passenger on to the 
floor. Apparently, there was a third Federal law enforcement officer on 
the plane as well, toward the back of the plane. Everyone was 
instructed to get their heads down, that they were diverting 
immediately to Dulles Airport.
  The plane landed safely. All of the law enforcement personnel came 
out to the plane. It was handled very professionally. It was handled 
very safely.
  I tell you this riveting story, just told to me by Senator Stabenow, 
to make the point that the American public desperately wants to feel 
safe when they get on an airplane. They want to know that the most 
highly qualified, highly trained personnel are the ones who are not 
only on that aircraft, as was just demonstrated by the sky marshals' 
professional behavior, but they want to know that the most highly 
trained, qualified law enforcement personnel are the ones who are doing 
law enforcement checks of the hand-carried baggage and the profiling to 
try to avoid any kind of incidents in the future that would jeopardize 
the safety of the American flying public.
  Now, it just seems to me that with so much at stake, not only for the 
safety of people in airplanes but for the economic engine of this 
country, which is being so devastatingly affected in places such as my 
State and 30 other States where travel and tourism are one of the top 
three industries, it would seem to me that we ought to be able to have 
a meeting of the minds, enact this legislation, and get it to the 
President, who has said he will sign what the Congress produces, and 
get on about restoring the confidence of the American public in the 
safety of flying.
  Madam President, I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Connecticut is recognized.

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