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CNN LIVE EVENT/SPECIAL

Texas Governor Rick Perry Holds Press Briefing

Aired February 2, 2003 - 16:14   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

MILES O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: We turn our attention to Austin, Texas, where we find Governor Rick Perry. We have to warn you, we have bad audio here, but we think it's good enough for government work, if you will. Let's listen in.
GOV. RICK PERRY, TEXAS: ... this facility and how we will respond.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yesterday, as the governor said, it is a 24-7 operation. I believe essentially the media was reporting this about 8:15. And I received a call almost simultaneously with the occurrence. And I was here within 30 or 35 minutes. And very shortly thereafter Colonel Davis, the study coordinator, this place was fully staffed within a matter of 45 minutes or so from the incident.

QUESTION: Is there any risk with drinking water? I heard this morning that some debris was found in Sabine County, I believe, and maybe (UNINTELLIGIBLE) a reservoir -- in some body of water.

PERRY: I think one of the reasons that we have a PCQ strike team en route is for that. But the response that we have heard from them was that the -- any debris in that large area of body of water should not be a problem at all.

QUESTION: Governor, do you know if the $5 million you'd be getting from the Federal Government will cover all of Texas the costs?

PERRY: We don't -- obviously the reason I can't give you an answer to that is we don't know how long this process is going to last. It's been my understanding that the Federal Government will reimburse us for the cost of the search and recovery effort.

QUESTION: What would there be beyond that that Texas might have to pick up?

PERRY: I'm not aware of any costs that -- other than the ongoing cost of running this command center, et cetera.

QUESTION: Would you encourage volunteers to come to the area to help search for debris?

PERRY: No. Listen to law enforcement, listen to the individuals at the local area to -- I'm sure there are lots of citizens that are finding debris that are reporting it. I think the most important thing for people to remember is that this can be very dangerous to their health. It can be very helpful to NASA as they reconstruct this tragedy and they need to report to the authorities any debris that is found. And keeping in mind, I think the -- (AUDIO GAP)

O'BRIEN: All right. Let's -- obviously we're having all kinds of technical problems there with Governor Rick Perry. We apologize for that.

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