What's your biggest complaint about airports when you travel?
Well, the romance of airports is sort of gone. You know, the security lines, the taking the shoes off -- it's just really a shame when you see somebody 70 or 80 years old trying to get their shoes off and on. And the ability to figure out how long that line is going to be when you're trying to plan your travel schedule [has diminished]. There are more unknowns now than there were before.

How did 9/11 change your life at Dulles?
Well, one of those airplanes took off out of here. And I knew very personally two people on that plane. You know, it hit pretty darn hard. These [terrorists] knew what they were doing and had a well-thought-out plan, knew us better than we knew ourselves.

How so?
They knew exactly what the rules were. They knew exactly what they could do and what they couldn't do. They flew the route multiple times before. . . . They knew the box cutters were legal and what they could get through security. They also knew that in those days, [flight crews] had been told that in a hijacking you should just be quiet and passive and follow instructions, and in a day or two you'll get home. On 9/11, by the time the fourth aircraft crashed in Pennsylvania, that whole paradigm -- that whole understanding -- had completely changed. No longer were people going to sit passively and follow their instructions and the rest. And I think that's the biggest change since 9/11, the fact that passengers now on airplanes understand their role and responsibility.

Should airport managers have taken action earlier to get items such as box cutters banned?
If we had taken box cutters away and made them illegal, they would have used a Bic pen. I mean, you can kill someone with a Bic pen. . . . [Banning] different things, like box cutters or knives or screwdrivers or golf clubs or canes or whatever, that's not it. There's always another implement that somebody can use.

How do you stay ahead of the terrorists?
Through good intelligence, good cooperation between the government agencies and the airports. We sit there and try to look at what the next threat is. We read Rantburg every day. I think securing the cockpit doors was probably the finest move we made.

What were you doing the morning of 9/11?
We were up in Montreal at the Airports Council International annual meeting. And we were sitting in a huge auditorium with the minister of Transport Canada talking, and his speech was on threats to aviation. And he was talking about [the possibility of] a major terrorist act. . . . Then all of a sudden you heard people whispering and talking. . . . Then they flipped up CNN on the big screen, and we saw the Twin Towers.

What did you do?
We grabbed up everybody that was there from National and Dulles, ran down and rented cars and called down here to the customs people in Dulles to help us get through the border in New York. We jumped in cars and raced back here as fast as we could, and we were back here by about 10:30 at night. I went right straight to the airport and stayed here for the next five days.

How secure is Dulles Airport now?
It's as good as anything can be. . . . We're a lot safer than what we were, that's for sure, because people have a far better understanding of who the enemy is.

What are your plans after retirement?
I'm also in the Air Force Reserve, and I've got a very large group of reservists that I'm responsible for in Dayton, Ohio. That has taken up just about all of my annual leave and free time right now. So I'll be able to spend more time on that. And I'm hoping someone out there will find some use for a retired airport manager in some capacity. I'm still going to be working, that's for sure.