John Ley: Pilot, Lawmaker, and Sept. 11 Insider

0:00This story was written by Paul Valencia with Clark County today.com. He was sound asleep after getting to his home in Vancouver late the previous night from his job as a pilot for Delta Airlines. Sometime around 6 a.m. Pacific time, his phone rang. Turn on the TV, he was told. The death, the horrors of the towers on fire, then the collapsing. John Lee recalled, it broke my heart. Almost immediately, he went to work. No, he was not flying anywhere, not with US airspace shut down by the Federal Aviation Administration. Instead, he and colleagues brainstormed on how to help crews and passengers all over the world, as well as come up with ways to protect passengers, crew members, and airplanes in the future. Today, many know John Lee as a representative of the 18th District in the Washington State legislature. Not many know that Lee was instrumental in changes made to the airline industry, changes that have become the norm today, 25 years after the attacks of September 11, 2001. At the time, he was a leader of the Delta Pilots Union. There were Delta crews all over the world,

1:00many who were stuck, unable to fly into American airspace. There are some amazing stories from some of our crews that diverted into Newfoundland. How can we help care for them? How can we work with the Federal Government to ultimately reopen the skies so we can bring these people back home? Not just them, but the passengers too. So they can be reunited with their loved ones, Lee said. Soon enough, Lee's attention turned to safety and security. He volunteered to be part of a 10 person committee made up of pilots. Their goal was how to protect airplanes to protect passengers from having to deal with this again. They came up with a white paper with dozens of suggestions. That report was presented to then Secretary of Transportation Norman Manetta. Some of those ideas were put into practice, Lee said. That included the known crew member ID system used in airports today, as well as new ways to screen passengers. Lee and colleagues also worked with Boeing and Airbus to bring about more secure cockpit doors to keep bad people out. Lee said, I was very much a part of that component of the security of our airplanes after the fact. He said, yet another new safety protocol did not come from pilots,

2:04the industry, nor the government. It was simply the actions of the passengers themselves. Before September 11th, 2001, hijackings were something from the 1960s and into the 1970s, with a few major cases in the 1980s as well. Many planes that were hijacked landed safely, with the passengers and crew then held hostage during a negotiating period. No one at the time was thinking that a hijacked plane would become the tool for destruction. The horrors of 9-11 changed the mindset of our passengers forever, Lee said. For the pilots in flight attendants, they now have another ally up in the air with them. If a flight attendant screams for help, the passengers are going to take action and come to their assistance, Lee said, in the long run, that's a good thing. We are all inspired, Lee said, by the passengers on United Flight 93, the plane that crashed in Pennsylvania. They said, no more, we will take action, Lee said. Another thing that Lee worked on was getting the federal government to allow pilots if they go through training to carry a firearm into the cockpit for domestic flights.

3:05Lee himself went through that training. There were specific rules on how to carry the weapon, how it is locked up, when it can be unlocked, it is a deterrent. The bad guys know we can carry. Somebody has to worry about that as an obstacle too, Lee said. After flying for Delta for 31 and a half years, Lee retired in June of 2020. His last assignment was Seattle to Honolulu and Beck. An unbelievable privilege, he said, of flying, are you kidding? I get to do this today. Every anniversary of September 11th hits hard for many Americans, especially those who work or worked in aviation. My heart aches for those crew members who died in the four airplanes and mostly for the passengers, Lee said. We never thought in a million years that an airplane would be used as a weapon, a missile, a bomb. Sadly, that's the new reality. He recalls a repeated statement during his military days. Pray for peace, but prepare for war. He is grateful for the first responders in New York who ran into the buildings, and he is grateful for the passengers on Flight 93 who fought the terrorists.

4:05John Lee also takes pride in that while he was employed by Delta, the work he and his colleagues performed in the aftermath in September 11th helped every pilot, every airline. In a sense, I'm proud of what we were able to do. To be part of offering well-thought-out ways in responding to the threats, what procedures we could change, Lee said. You have to think the unthinkable and have your guard up.