60 Minutes II

<I>60 Minutes II</i>: Defending The Games

By CBSNews.com staff CBSNews.com staff

January 9, 2002 / 11:54 AM EST / CBS

In 30 days, the 2002 Winter Olympic Games begin in Salt Lake City. An estimated 80,000 people a day will be crowding into venues to watch the competition. Another 3 billion worldwide are expected to be watching on TV.

Protecting the athletes, spectators and the games in what may be the largest security operation in U.S. history is the United States Secret Service, the same agency that protects the president. And this is not the only game the Secret Service is playing; they're also securing the Super Bowl, to be played in New Orleans just five days before the Olympics start.

CBS News Correspondent Scott Pelley recently toured Olympic venues with Secret Service Director Brian Stafford who, in his first interview since Sept. 11, said an Olympic terror threat is real, even though there's no known plot specifically targeting the games.

In fact, Stafford states categorically that terrorist initiatives have been foiled since September. "There have been events, initiatives, that have been thwarted," he told Pelley. "Could they have been directed at these games? Possibly. That's probably as close as I can come on that one."

In an interview with CBS News Early Show anchor Bryant Gumbel Thursday, U.S. Homeland Security director Tom Ridge said there was no specific reason to believe terrorists will target the Olympics.

"This extraordinary group of 60 federal, state and local agencies have been working for over two and a half years to make sure that this is probably one of the most secure places in the world at that time and, obviously, one of the most secure sporting events ever," he said.

The Secret Service got the job of Olympic security three years ago when it was put in charge of any occasion declared a "national special security event." The idea grew out of the last American Olympics in Atlanta in 1996.

Passing the Torch

Click here to see the different venues for the Salt Lake City Olympics and follow the path of the Olympic torch to Utah.

There, a bomb killed one woman and injured 111 others. It turned out that security was heavy but coordination was light. No one agency, no single person was in charge. In Salt Lake, the buck stops with the Secret Service.

Overseeing all Olympic security is Mark amillo. A former teacher and a karate master, Camillo has stood guard for the president, coordinated security at the U.N. and now he's running the biggest job in Secret Service history. His staff has been planning for more than two years — pulling together the FBI, National Guard, Utah's state police and local police.

They're covering 14 Olympic venues and the athlete's village with a $300-million security blanket — triple what was spent in Atlanta.

Ridge defends spending that much for the security of a private enterprise like the Olympics.

"I think it's very important from time to time to showcase America and particularly in light of September 11," he said. "We will continue to be America. And we look forward to hosting these Olympics.

Camillo thought he'd mastered the games until the rules changed in September.

"We knew immediately here that our event had to be re-examined to make sure that as good as it was—that we left not stone unturned," he said.

The largest security force in Olympic history includes elite squads like the counter assault — or "CAT" — team. Rarely seen even though it always travels with the president, the team is trained to repel a coordinated terrorist attack. You won't see them at the Olympics, but they'll be there, covering kings, queens and heads of state.

Also to be hidden in the stadium and around the games are members of the counter-sniper team. These agents train constantly, using targets that are many, many times farther away than those any Olympic marksmen is required to shoot.

The counter-sniper and CAT teams are part of a security force of thousands that will be spread across 900 square miles of the Wasatch range with peaks over 9,600 feet tall. Winds in the snow basin, where skiing events will be held, can be well over 40 mph and temperatures can be 10 degrees below zero or more.

Among the agents helping to secure sites like that is John Perry, a Forest Service cop who grew up skiing in Idaho.

"With the officers we've got coming out," he said, "everybody's had some experience at it and they know what the complications are and know how to succeed in those situations."

The Secret Service has deputized officers from across the nation, people who can compete even on Olympic runs. Their parkas are loaded with weapons and surveillance gear, like heat-sensing cameras. It's hard to hide a 98-degree body against a 20-below background.

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"What this does," said Perry, "is give our officers that are gonna be out on their post — the swing shift, graveyard shift, in the darkness — a way to see the outer perimeter and check for anybody entering the area or leaving the area. And it's our eyes in the night."

Technology is everywhere in Salt Lake City, even if you don't see it. Around the Olympic Village is a "smart" fence that signals for help if someone tries to cut or climb it.

To guard the 3,500 athletes, coaches and trainers inside, said Camillo, "we'll have screening locations up, working with personnel there on a 24-hours basis. Nothing comes into the village unless it's been screened beforehand."

Mitt Romney, chief executive offficer of the Salt Lake Olympics, admits there will be some challenges. "To make sure that people can get through the magnetometers quickly enough, to get into the venue and enjoy the show, we're telling people to come very, very early."

There will be 80,000 people each day. To defend against bombs, spectators will be admitted only on foot or by bus, parking their cars about 10 miles away in a massive 70-acre parking lot and gettting on transit buses that will drop them off at security checkpoints.

Those buses and every other vehicle allowed in will be screened by agents and bomb-sniffing dogs. And every venue will be secured , Stafford said, as if the president were to visit it.

While much of the security was planned before Sept. 11, the attacks on New York and Washington added new twists.

The Secret Service rewrote its plan for air defense, requiring the Salt Lake airport to be shut down during the opening and closing ceremonies and designating a large part of Utah as a "no-fly zone" for 17 days.

The military will provide fighter coverage. "We do not intend to tolerate anything coming at us from the air," said Camillo.

Athletes like Emily Cook, one of the best aerialists in America, are confident that the Secret Service will come through. Her cousin, Kathy Nikosia, was a flight attendant on American flight 11, the first plane into the World Trade Center.

"The biggest thing that I've taken out of it," Cook said, "is to keep going. The one thing that I feel I can give back to my family is to keep training and to compete and represent my country in February and to hopefully stand on the podium and listen to our national anthem and watch the flag be raised over our heads and give our country something to smile about."

Like Cook and the other athletes, the Secret Service is training toward that same goal. "Although we won't necessarily win a medal here," Camillo said, "You should put a scratch in our win column because we're going to win this game."