Exclusive: After Capitol Riot, Super Bowl Security Ramped Up with Drones, Dirty Bomb Detectors, More
On 1/31/21 at 9:51 AM EST
Super Bowl LV was always going to be strange, what with COVID-19 pandemic protocols and Tom Brady playing for not-the-Patriots. The January 6 Capitol riot is changing the game again, prompting the Department of Homeland Security to issue a National Terrorism Advisory System (NTAS) Bulletin last Wednesday declaring a heightened threat environment. After recent events, we are looking at the lessons learned . and we are applying [them] to the Super Bowl, says Kevin Sibley, the number two at the federal Homeland Security Investigations field office in Tampa, Florida, where the event will take place. Hundreds of additional police and federal officials are being activated. We have assets in place and are prepared, Tampa Police Assistant Chief Ruben Garcia said at a news conference this week. It s an all-hands-on-deck event, he said.
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The American flag flies at half-staff as inauguration construction continues on the west front of the US Capitol on Jan. 9.
The proceedings that will take place on the morning of Jan. 20, in public view on the west front of the United States Capitol, just steps from the insurrection that killed five people, endangered Congress and the vice president, and led to the resignation of the Capitol Police chief, amount to what is known in Washington, DC, as a “National Special Security Event.
You will hear a lot more about National Special Security Events, aka NSSEs, in the next eight days. Joe Biden’s inaugural officials, eager to allay security concerns after President Donald Trump’s supporters broke into the Capitol last Wednesday, tick off the letters in quick succession, N-S-S-E, in conversations about the implications of the acronym. In many cases, NSSEs can take more than a year to plan. When something is an NSSE, it means that multiple federal age