Preparing for the mega security needed to keep Super Bowl 50 an awesome experience

Check out the link for the full story published by Evan Sernoffsky  with the San Francisco Chronicle

Super Bowl 50 security

Federal agents and police are turning Levi’s Stadium into a near fortress for Super Bowl 50, and in San Francisco they are walling off the main venue for pregame festivities with fences and metal detectors to deter would-be saboteurs. But they warn that the crowded city streets and public transit lines remain exposed targets. With terrorist attacks in San Bernardino and Paris still fresh on the minds of citizens around the world, security experts in the Bay Area have been beefing up efforts to see that the nation’s most high-profile sporting event comes off without trouble. Super Bowl setup. Still, Jeffrey Harp, retired FBI assistant special agent in charge of the San Francisco office, said there is no way to completely safeguard the Feb. 7 game and surrounding events that are expected to draw more than 1 million people to the Bay Area. “If someone wants to commit an act, they’re going to commit an act. There’s only so much that we can do,” said Harp, who worked as on-scene commander for the FBI’s SWAT team at several massive San Francisco events — including three chaotic World Series and an America’s Cup. The FBI and Department of Homeland Security — the lead agencies overseeing and coordinating Super Bowl security — are taking more precautions than usual for this year’s nine days of Super Bowl hoopla, the longest in the game’s history. But a chief concern is securing other open public areas where revelers will be gathering and Bay Area residents will be going about their daily lives.

“These disastrous acts are committed where you get the most bang for your buck, and you don’t have to be inside a stadium to run into a big crowd,” said Harp, who retired from the FBI in October and was part of the early planning for the Super Bowl. Federal authorities working out of a joint operations center, in an undisclosed location, will monitor surveillance equipment and police radio traffic while they communicate with officers from dozens of law enforcement agencies, plainclothes agents and tactical teams on the ground. “We consider this event an all-hands-on-deck situation. Every resource we have available will be dedicated to this event,” said Prentice Danner, a spokesman for the FBI’s San Francisco office. The Department of Homeland Security this week put out a memo to local jurisdictions, reminding them about potential threats to infrastructure — including fiber-optic cable networks that have been vandalized in the Bay Area before. The leaked memo also included emerging threats, like the possibility of a drone dispersing a harmful substance from above. At Levi’s Stadium, the FBI has been running drills in preparation for a possible attack. Agents, along with Santa Clara police and county sheriff’s deputies, were conducting security exercises in the fall, shortly after a team of terrorists carried out the coordinated massacre in Paris. The Paris mass killings, Harp said, could have been more disastrous had three suicide bombers not been turned away by security at the Stade de France, where 80,000 fans, including the country’s president, Francois Hollande, were attending a soccer game.

“It was the pat-down guys and the metal detectors that prevented that from being much worse,” said Harp, who now works as a security consultant for a private company. Similar pat-downs, and metal-detector screenings — like at any 49ers game — will be going on at Levi’s Stadium, with a larger-than-usual law enforcement presence inside and outside the venue ready to scramble at a moment’s notice.

Super Bowl City, the free fan village set up in Justin Herman Plaza along the Embarcadero, will be fenced in with four entry points where people will be screened before being let in. Fans entering the Moscone Center for the NFL Experience are to be carefully inspected and no food, drinks or coolers — or of course weapons — let in, NFL officials said. But as history shows, determined attackers often find a way to carry out devastating acts. While no terrorist attack on U.S. soil has been as big as the one committed on Sept. 11, 2001, that killed nearly 3,000 people in New York City, the Pentagon and Shanksville, Pa., saboteurs have since wreaked havoc on a small scale, with soft targets the preferred choice.

Two brothers, who killed three and injured hundreds of others during the 2013 Boston Marathon, planted two homemade bombs in backpacks along a crowded sidewalk under the noses of scores of police and civilians. Last month, a radicalized couple in San Bernardino executed 14 people during a holiday party, where no security guards or police were on hand. During the Super Bowl, the Bay Area will be full of such soft targets. “There’s no way to stop a lone wolf if they’re bent on it,” Harp said.

That’s why the San Francisco Police Department won’t be letting officers have any time off from Jan. 30 — when the events kick off — until the end of the Super Bowl. Even non-patrol personnel will be on hand to help out, said police spokesman Sgt. Michael Andraychak. “The idea is to have a very, very visible police presence around San Francisco,” he said. “There will be uniformed officers on foot, on motorcycles, on bikes and other officers assisting traffic control.”   The Bay Area’s major transportation agencies have been working closely with federal authorities and the host committee to develop a robust security strategy. BART will be activating an emergency operations center during the days around the Super Bowl and sending out extra officers to patrol trains and stations around the region, said agency spokesman Jim Allison. While the transportation agency is already at peak levels during its busiest commute times, BART officials will be holding back on any nonessential maintenance and adding additional cars to its trains to handle the crowds. Muni will also be on guard and officials said they’re bolstering bus and railcar security. “Just as we have a coordinated plan to get people around efficiently, we have a plan to help keep people safe,” agency spokesman Paul Rose said. But the biggest security asset to law enforcement during the Super Bowl is the public, especially in less-secure areas, a mantra echoed by every major law-enforcement agency around the Bay Area.  “Our goal is to prohibit anything from going astray, and the public’s vigilance is key to that,” Danner said. “If you see something, say something. It really is important.” What’s more, federal officials said they’re looking into the possibility of threats from above — beyond hypothetical dangers from a drone. The Federal Aviation Administration — which expects more than 1,000 more flights than usual to come into the Bay Area for the Super Bowl — will be imposing temporary flight restrictions around the South Bay from 2 p.m. to midnight on the day of the game. Flights will be most restricted into Mineta San Jose International Airport, Moffett Federal Airfield, Reid-Hillview Airport and Palo Alto Airport, said FAA spokesman Ian Gregor. In the end, federal authorities are banking on the Super Bowl being a hit — other than a few headaches from people stuck among the swarming crowds, and the possibility of El Ni?o soaking everybody. “The city of San Francisco is an icon city,” Harp said. “The FBI and law enforcement are doing everything they can to make it fun and safe.”