LAX to Add 1,200 Surveillance Cameras for Increased Security

The city hopes to curb evacuations and more closely monitor terminals for criminal activity at Los Angeles International Airport by quintupling the number of surveillance cameras focused on facility curbs, ticket lobbies, terminal doors and the airfield.

The city agency that operates LAX will spend as much as $20 million to add 1,200 closed-circuit television cameras in the airport’s nine terminals and on the 3,500-acre airfield by December 2004. Each terminal will receive up to 150 new cameras.

The security upgrade, announced Thursday by Mayor James K. Hahn at LAX, follows strong criticism of the city’s failure to capture on tape the fatal Fourth of July shooting at the Tom Bradley International Terminal. Ticket lobbies at the airport now have no video cameras.

Officials said that having cameras in the Bradley lobby would not have prevented the shooting at the El Al Israel Airlines ticket counter, where seven airport police officers and several undercover officers stood guard Thursday morning. But they said video of the incident would have helped police sort out what happened.

“It would have made the follow-up investigation easier, because we would have been able to look at more things,” said Bernard J. Wilson, airport police chief.

Thursday’s announcement was the latest in a series of moves by Hahn to bolster security at LAX, including a request that the airport agency pay 60 Los Angeles Police Department officers overtime to patrol the facility and a plan to spend $15 million on new fencing and other technology around the facility’s perimeter.

The new security camera program will integrate four existing systems at LAX that operate independently of one another. These systems, with a total of 300 cameras, are used by airport police to deter theft at security checkpoints and in parking lots; by operations personnel to monitor the airfield; by airlines to watch ramps and terminals; and by various U.S. agencies to keep tabs on Customs Service facilities.

After the upgrade, airport police will be able to view pictures provided by each of 1,500 cameras from a new centralized monitoring station.

“LAX will be the first airport in the U.S. to have such a comprehensive system,” said Paul Green, chief operating officer.

Officials emphasized that the airport’s current camera system meets federal guidelines, which require that cameras be installed at the entrances and exits of security checkpoints.

Law enforcement officers will be able to tap into the new camera system wirelessly using a hand-held computer and pull down live photos or a video clip of a suspect. The same technology has undergone testing at London’s Heathrow Airport but has yet to be used regularly in a public place like LAX, said Jonathan Phillips, a principal communications consultant for Arup Co. who advised the airport agency on the technology.

Having immediate access to a picture of a criminal suspect or the perpetrator of a security breach would help police find the individual more quickly and reduce terminal evacuations, officials said.

“This will help with problems like last week where a human error allowed someone to get through the system,” said Hahn, referring to a security breach in Terminal 5 on Saturday that forced the evacuation of the airport’s entire south side, delaying 150 flights and stranding 8,000 passengers. “We want to minimize those inconveniences in the future using this video system.”

U.S. House Minority Leader Richard A. Gephardt (D-Mo.) appeared with Hahn in the Bradley terminal and called on the White House to support additional funding for airports to implement new security measures.