Stay updated with breaking news from Gate atlanta. Get real-time updates on events, politics, business, and more. Visit us for reliable news and exclusive interviews.
P.m. today, a weapon accidently discharged atlanta s security screening area. there is not an active shooter at the airport. apd, atlanta police department, is on the scene. more information about the situation will be made available on our social media channels. the faa did order a ground stop that has since been lifted. meantime, you still have thousands of travelers that are inside the airport. we spoke with one traveller who also happens to be the father-in-law of one of our correspondents, nadia romero, who said he has not been allowed to leave the airport. the investigation is ongoing. i have a host of people with me now, juliet, mary and chief charles ramsey, all with me now. so i wonder, chief, to you first, as they investigate while atlanta pd has put out a rather comforting statement saying, essentially, we ve got ....
Calm for the most part right now. so, mr. romero, once you get, you know, through the terminals and you re trying to exit the airport, have you thought about your plan? how are you going to be able to exit the airport or be on your way? right now they told us we are just on lockdown. we re just hanging out here. if we don t have baggage, we can go to concourse f, it s a 30-minute walk and we can exit and have our rides or try to get to rental cars that way. you could come back later in the night or day if you have your airline tickets and claim your baggage later, whenever they open it. and what was the city that you were traveling from, if i might ask? salt lake city. so you had a really a long flight, a pretty long flight, about three or four hour flight to atlanta and now you re going ....
Go. who and what entity would now assist in security just for the number of people who would amass here? well, between tsa and atlanta pd, and i would imagine they tabletop this sort of thing on a fairly regular basis to know who is responsible for doing what, to try to make this as quick as possible. but still, right now they re saying an accidental discharge but that doesn t mean it still isn t an investigation that has to take place as to why it happened. these things simply should not happen. now, it doesn t mean it s a threat to other people at all, but they still have to get to the bottom of it. but as far as airline operations go, i m sure they tabletop this to try to minimize the amount of time there is a disruption when you have something occur. mary, a major disruption here, as we said. atlanta is a major hub, so you ve got planes already in the ....
That they have in place there in atlanta, at the airport, the authorities there, is to be able to put out good information, because people need to know what s going on. because without that, that s what usually causes the anger, the panic, and everything else, people don t know. they re starving for information. so if social media is putting stuff out, that s what they re going to read. if that s not accurate, that s what they re going to believe. that s got to be part of the plan. mary, i see you gesturing, other people can t see because they re looking at the live picture of the airport. do you want to add to what chief ramsey is saying? yes, and you just performed a very important public service because i m in and out of atlanta airport practically every week and cnn is playing on almost every tv in the airport. everyone in the airport now knows, thanks to you, that it was an accidental discharge and things will be moving again soon. but kudos to cnn, you just made a massive bro ....
The u.s. this is a heavy, massively heavy travel weekend, after a pandemic. we are all just beginning to travel again, many of us, many people taking their first flight for a very long time this weekend, and so that combination has led to this. like what chief ramsey said, the atlanta airport got out quickly, hopefully they re going to start to do some psas within the airport to tell passengers what is going on. people are driving in to pick up their family and friends this holiday weekend, essentially, and so there s going to have to be massive communication. once again, this is not a tragedy, it is a massive inconvenience, and in this day and age that is great news. okay, and then this information coming from atlanta pd in this tweet they just now sent out, saying at approximately 1:30 p.m. today a weapon accidently discharged ....