What Can You Do To Combat Terrorism?
Once again, we want to take this opportunity to offer our condolences to all those who lost family, friends, colleagues and clients in the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11.
While it might be very difficult if not impossible to reconcile the presence of such incredible evil in this world with whatever spiritual beliefs you might harbor, the important point to remember is that each and every one of us has the ability to personally make a difference, here and now, both to help in the painful recovery from this crisis, as well as to make sure nothing like it ever happens again.
The insurance and risk management communities have enormous roles to play in this recovery, as well as in the effort to prevent further attacks.
Insurers must proceed rapidly, professionally and compassionately to make sure that all valid claims are paid as quickly as possible. They must also refrain from the legal hair-splitting that so often throws disputes over legitimate claims into court, making sure they live up to the spirit, as well as the letter of their insurance policies.
Risk managers also have their hands full, as this attack was a wake-up call not just to those in charge of airline security, but to every firm whose business is vulnerable to a potential terrorist assault, directly or indirectly.
Risk managers need to review their emergency office evacuation procedures to get people to safety in a crisis, as well as examine their potential business interruption exposures.
We will leave it to the government of the United States and its allies to try to eradicate terrorism at its source. Still, there is much that risk managers, along with loss control and safety experts at insurance companies and brokerages can do to more confidently assure our domestic security.
The first focus will be on the air traffic system. U.S. Transportation Secretary Norman Mineta has already convened two task forces to examine the problem and report back with recommendations by Oct. 1–one to tackle airport security, the other on airplane security.
Big changes are needed in the way we screen passengers and baggage before allowing them aboard a plane. For one, those who handle these critical tasks are underpaid, poorly trained, and generally unappreciated, resulting in untenable turnover rates. This leaves our security in the hands of inexperienced, unqualified people.
We also need to make sure that all airports are using state-of-the-art screening technology, but we must keep in mind that people remain the key element–machines are only as good as the people who operate them.
Still, we can't help but think that these terrorist attacks were not the result of lapses in airport security, since the terrorists did not carry guns or bombs on board. But this was clearly a failure of onboard security. We need armed sky marshals on every flight, reinforced cockpits, and armed pilots to serve as a last-stand defense.
These steps won't be cheap and they won't be easy, but they are necessary to restore the nation's sense of security in flying, and to begin to regain the business and tourist traffic necessary to keep the airline industry and our economy going strong.
Reproduced from National Underwriter Property & Casualty/Risk & Benefits Management Edition, September 21, 2001. Copyright 2001 by The National Underwriter Company in the serial publication. All rights reserved.Copyright in this article as an independent work may be held by the author.
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