Al Corbi, Air & Space Museum Curator, Overheard at DCA Airport

Now on 105.9 FM and streaming worldwide on the WMAL app, O'Connor and company. WMAL. Good morning to you and good Friday to you as we end a very busy week in the nation's capital as we try to put aside all of the the news and the bluster and the drama and refocus on what's most important this very holy week and heading us toward Easter Sunday. We're doing our best in that regard. I hope you're along with us for the ride. Coming up in 30 minutes we're gonna have a conversation with the curator for the Apollo exhibit over at the National Air and Space Museum, Tiesel Muir Harmony. Very excited to have that conversation talk about the Artemis mission and how it sort of fits into the grand scheme of things. Also this year the 50th anniversary of the Air and Space Museum probably one of the most popular attractions on the mall. Have you taken your little girl Alex Sawyer to the Air and Space Museum? I have and you know what I will say they have like some kids stuff but I feel like it could do better. The kids exhibit could be so much better. For these little ones too. For the littlest ones you are right. It is more I would say the wheelhouse is 7 to 17. Yeah it's older. It's definitely older. But once she's at that age she's gonna all the virtual the simulators all of the... Like you can't touch anything like the one thing that they had and you know she's forced so she runs up and grabs it right so that was they need some... Get your kid under control. Monster maniac running and ruining the exhibit on the Spirit of 76. Hey I wanted to run and touch it too Larry. It looks really cool. Only Apple doesn't fall far. Alright joining us right now is Al Corby. Now he's the president founder of SAFE. This is a company that makes well well I mean there's no other way to say it. Prepper bunkers. Doomsday bunkers you know but by the way they're amazing. I gotta tell you what you've got going on Al under the ground is more impressive and more luxurious than anything I've built above the ground. So good on you. Listen we've all sort of been seeing here. Listen to President Trump yesterday because he's under fire for the ballroom and all that stuff and everybody knows anyone who knows anything knows that there's a huge network of facilities underneath the White House in the bunker there and this ballroom project the former East Wing has turned into an opportunity to really upgrade all of the bunker stuff underneath there. Here take a listen to President Trump talking about it. Ballroom which has come out recently because of a stupid lawsuit that was filed but the military is building a massive complex under the ballroom and that's under construction and we're doing very well so we're ahead of schedule it's part of it. The ballroom essentially becomes a shed for what's being built under the military including from drones and including from any other thing. The glass on the windows you see the big windows the glass is extremely thick it's high grade bulletproof glass so all of the windows are bulletproof. Obviously you need some major security there but you know he gave you a little bit of a hint as to what's being built under the ground there. What do you think based on your knowledge and your expertise how extensive is this complex under the White House? Well you know you kind of want to frame it to begin with. Presidential bunker isn't a place for the president to go and hide. I mean it's got nothing to do with that actually. It's where leadership continues when everything around us is chaotic. It's really our last chance not his. You know what I mean? Yeah yeah you're right a lot of people make it sound like oh the president's gonna go cower and fear and hide from whatever. No it's so he can continue you know being commander in chief. Exactly and that's the whole point. I mean over the last 50 years I've designed these protective environments that need to be operational in national level emergencies. They're really there for all of us. I'm not the one that's gonna be pushing a button. Someone else has to and if they don't do it I'm gonna lose. So I kind of look at the ballroom as my last chance. What do you think are like some of the key components that the president's going to need and those building this bunker down there? Like what is the top that comes to mind? Well you know that's really the question. That's the important one. What does this thing have to do? Well first off it's got to survive the event. We know you know it doesn't do that. It didn't work okay. Then we need for the people in there to be able to maintain communications and then they have to preserve the command authority. If it does that there are quarterbacks. They're down there keeping us all safe. So you know this nonsense we're hearing about don't do it, don't let it happen, don't build it. I don't know where that's coming from. It's not gonna save me. I'm not gonna be in it. It's TDS is where it's coming from. Now your company it's safe-us.com. I've been looking at your website and I'm trying to block this on my wife's browser because dude she I mean honestly she'll we'll lose our fortune by giving it to you sir because this is what she wants. I have to interrupt you because this is terrific. It's always the wives that come to us. And what you're capable of doing you do panic rooms you you can make a hardened home to protect the home itself but then you dive deep and I do mean that literally into the kind of bunker facilities. This is not you know a family of four cowering with MREs waiting for the air raid to finish. These are some of the most elaborate bunkers. What is your training? What is your background to be able to do these things? And also who's buying these other than you know the Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg? Well the training was coming from a family that had more protection and security back in the day than the White House. Not now but back then. And then for 23 years I was the lead architect for the Department of Justice designing black ops facilities around the world. So... Oh have you written a book yet Al? Or are you not allowed to? I'll send you a copy. So who are your customers? I mean obviously the president is the president and when he's not the president he's still Donald Trump. But are you getting calls from people all the time saying that they want a basic facility for just in case? Well kind of wrap your arms around this. I'll give you two examples that happen in the same year. Okay keep in mind these both happen the same year. We get a call from a gentleman. He shows up the next day in his entourage and when the project was done it was $103 million for a protective shelter for one property. $103 million. Okay same year same year we get a call from Oprah. She gave us $1,500 to protect the house. One for viewers. We gave her $200 back. We protected the house for $1,300. So this was the same year. $1,300 million. You know think of it I often make I like cars. I like them things to cars. You know how a Toyota is a really good car. Starts up, gets you where you want to go. Really works right? Yeah. Okay it costs $20,000. A Bugatti is a really nice car. Two doors, four tires just like the Toyota. It's gonna cost you $20 million. Yeah. They're both cars. It just depends what you want to do with them. But 20 years from now that Bugatti isn't gonna be doing anything for you but that forerunner probably still gonna be getting you from the native. One of the things that we were talking about the president but I have I guess my curiosity is just going so I'm gonna ask you what's one of the weirdest things that any client has requested for their bunker like what you know what was the most unusual I guess request you've had and also like what are people I went to your website and I know I like so I'm going I want a residential bunker and then it asks like the primary purpose like emergency shelter if there's a natural disaster or civil unrest protection like what are people coming to you what's their biggest concern yeah what's the fear we know we go back to that earlier example of 103 million or billion and the 1300 people everyone's different I guarantee the two of you are wildly different and when you come to me you have something in mind we're doing two projects right now I don't know if you've seen the fiery lake project but this is probably outside of maybe Putin's mountain this is the coolest private estate in the world right now in the world and this was a very simple nice gentleman that had a focus no matter what happens in the world I want my family to be safe and we want to be Adam and Eve so you know we we want nothing to be able to take us out okay that's at the one extreme you know and then you have the other people who are still living on the surface of the planet and not in their bunkers they got to get that to work we got traffic but hold on for 60 seconds Vince Colnays is redefining news talk I'm Vince Colnays host of the Vince podcast I'm bringing you the truth beneath the headlines of all of the nation's top stories in depth interviews we feature newsmaking interviews with the top guests on the whole planet and I'll ask the questions you only dream of other interviewers asking and a front row seat to the most important conversations of the day there's a show with an obsessive focus on what's good for America you are going to love Vince the Vince show following listen on your favorite platform El Corby is the president founder of safe that's safe-us.com he is an expert in security in creating safe environments hardening your house creating panic rooms and bunkers and we wanted to talk to Al as an expert as we've learned more and more about the extensive bunker that's being constructed under the White House or expanded I should say under the White House and of course the ballroom is sort of the afterthought that's sort of being built on top I go to the website here and I see a picture of the White House is that just for you know it's a pretty building and you know I grabbed a grabbed some stock footage of the White House or have you actually done projects at 1600 Pennsylvania let's just say everything on the website are things we've been involved with. Alright enough said let's get back to the the there's a lot of people in this area who work for the government have worked in the military continue to do work even outside the government that may raise security concerns for themselves and their families do you get do you get a lot of business here in the DC area of people who are looking for very specific security needs? DC has always been very kind to us but the fact in the matter is we are global calls come in you know three in the morning while you're dead asleep from somebody that you can't quite understand and you're on a plane the next day so it's just whoever wants to be safe that day. This is a Netflix series waiting to be made. Is there like a kind like you you mentioned that is there a part of the world that you have most that you get those calls from more than others? Well and as you can imagine yes and it's forever changing because you know as the threats move people become more and more concerned more and more aware and they think oh you know I better act I better do something now so it typically is a knee jerk reaction to something that they've been thinking about for a long time. Are there clients that you won't take you know I'm guessing if back in the day Osama bin Laden called you and said yeah I could use a bunker you'd probably say no no thanks man we don't want your money but I mean beyond that I mean are there are do you sort of like make a judgment call and say I'm not interested in protecting your life. No Osama bin Laden called me back then he'd still be alive. The thing is that where we draw the line is recent news you know the whole Epstein thing. Oh yeah No no no there are places we draw the line. I'm not here to make judgments about people when they call in if it's Mother Teresa I'll protect her. Whoever it is will protect them but yes there are lines and I think they're probably the same ones you'd have. I don't know I'm pretty surprised that you'd build a bunker for Osama. Well the thing is when someone calls in to be protected I don't know them at that time and you meet with them and you do what they need and they are protected. 52 years we've never had a client harmed we've never had their possessions compromised. Can you imagine anyone else being able to say that. I'd like to think that the government that's why I'm glad to see the White House is on your homepage because clearly you're operating at a pretty high level here. Are there are there sort of like you said you could help Oprah for $1500. Do you see more of that business of just families who would like you know what just for whatever reason we'd like a safe place to go and to be able to have some resources and some stockpile of things and just a basic or do you see more of the elaborate stuff. Both but what's interesting is people are becoming more educated. Remember that old commercial and educated consumer is our best client. The fact is once you start becoming educated and you understand that this is doable remember the car analogy you can have security at any price point you just have to know what it is and the and people are starting to find that out now. The internet's a great thing. It's educated people greatly to what they can do. So we're getting a huge influx of people like me you know just middle American people. I often say I'm a Rolls Royce salesman that drives home every night and a Rusty Dow Volkswagen. I can't afford my own product. You know so people like me now want to protect our families and they're going wait a minute I can afford that. So they go for it. What do people want to stockpile? Like I'm guessing food and water is the number one. Well you nailed it. I mean that that is think of a clock. There are certain things you as a human being need to stay alive and the shortest clock times are water food certain medications depending upon you like if there's nuclear fallout there's certain medications you want to take right away and you'll be fine. So there's a very finite list it's not that long but you should have those things. President Trump building a enormous and elaborate military grade bunker there at the White House for obviously his successors and for future presidents and on the top a pretty nice looking ballroom as well and we just wanted to know. I very much advise you go check out the website so you can see just how elaborate those bunkers can be and how impressive Al's work is. Al Corby thanks for joining us and shedding some light on this. Well thank you for that and good luck to you guys. Thank you. Well I don't like somebody in his position saying good luck. Yeah good luck good luck. Thanks Al. Let's take 24. All right. On the WMAL app O'Connor and company. 8 36 on this good Friday 30 minutes from now it's time for Chris Plant to pick up the baton and run with it. It's Larry O'Connor here with a Washington Times specialist Alex Sawyer. Good morning. I haven't mentioned your podcast today. Remind everybody of your podcast. It is. It's the court watch podcast and then I also have the sit down with Alex Sawyer all at the Washington Times. I love how you call me the Washington Times specialist. I think I'm going to go to Chris Dolan the editor-in-chief and be like hey I think this is the new title I want. Well I know Chris. I'm just poking him a little bit and trying to you know get his attention as always. He's a good man and I'm sure this week's court watch podcast is going to be all over the arguments with regard to birthright citizenship. That's right. Yes really good analysis there. Make sure you check it out. All right. Joining us right now. Honestly this may be the person holds the job that is most envied by pretty much everyone in this town except for you know want to sit in the Oval Office. Teasel Mirror Harmony is the curator of the Apollo collection at the National Air and Space Museum and I hope I didn't mangle your name too badly. Thanks for joining us. It's my pleasure. You got it perfectly. So everybody's back focusing on the moon right now because of the incredible Artemis mission. Are you seeing. Listen the museum's always jam packed. It's one of the top attractions off the mall but there's got to be even more renewed interest in the Apollo mission and all of the incredible exhibits you've got there. Yeah it's so exciting to see the museum in jam packed right now. You're right. But I've been observing just so much enthusiasm in general for this mission and thinking back about the Apollo program and what the country achieved in the 1960s and 70s and trying to understand the significance of this Artemis mission in relationship to you know this previous heritage of space exploration and I love all the deep dive questions I've been getting about the Apollo program. It's a really exciting time. It's got to blow kids minds away when they go and adults for that matter when they go and see the Apollo mission and recognize that basically the mission that we're seeing right now with Artemis to even though it's going a little bit further around the moon I think this is the same as the Apollo 8 I want to say. I can't remember which number it was but they did it all without computers or really computers that we know of today AI machine learning. They did it with slide rules and they barely had calculators Tiesel. Yeah that's true. The technology was at a very different stage especially computing but Apollo did really use the contributions of thousands of people working around the clock to make sure things are happening and so although yeah the computer systems today on board Artemis are much more advanced during the Apollo era you had just incredible amounts of teamwork where you could have lots of different people performing these calculations doing these checks working together and it was a really well oiled machine so it is amazing to think back how they got to the moon given the technology of the day but it was this combination of both technology and teamwork with humans bringing what they could to the mission so it's always important to remember how it worked and everyone worked together to make it happen. I think you're probably in an interesting position to do you ever converse with some of the conspiracy theorists? Like what are some of the most interesting questions you've received? So the funny thing is I already get asked this question but I haven't yet to meet a conspiracy theorist in the flash so I can tell you I really want to answer some good responses. We hear from them all the time. You should come hang out with talk radio hosts more often. Often they'll say they know they're concerned about how did the astronauts survive the radiation as they go through the Van Allen radiation belts and radiation is a big important issue in space but the exposure is relatively minimal going up the speeds they're going to there. They're fine and on all the radiation exposure that getting it's monitored and they have radiation protection built into the spacecraft but some of the other conspiracy theories just focus on this is just so hard is what it's so hard to do and I think it's sort of a testament to how impressive it was to send humans to the moon in the 1960s so I take it maybe as a compliment to the program. Do you see a lot of young people coming through the museum because we were just talking about like some of the kids are the ones that we think it's I mean just over the top excited about this sort of thing which is really cool it's a great educational opportunity. Yes tons of kids come to the museum and and get really inspired by seeing this you know the spacecraft even from the 60s and then we have exhibits that are focusing on more contemporary space as well but one thing I really love about the museum is you walk through the National Air and Space Museum you will see every single age of person and you will see people from all over the country all over the world coming through it really draws every single kind of person you can imagine and it really speaks to how aerospace and these stories resonate with people. It's always remarkable to me because it's one of the most visited museums in the world it's a relatively narrow focus but it's it's a topic that really excites people and you see that excitement in little kids for sure and inspiring them actually quite a few people will talk about how they went to that museum as children and then wanted to go into aerospace or related fields and I know I was one of them I grew up you know as a kid taking a family vacation to the Air and Space Museum and it really affected my path so I can I can relate to that as well. Well and listen if my kids are like other kids a lot of times at these museums you just sort of you force the kids to go through the museum just so they can get to the gift shop but they would rather just go to the gift shop right away. Air and Space is a little different because it's a lot of fun but eventually they're gonna end up in the gift shop which leads me to my question do you have Artemis swag now? Are you selling stuff? We do have Artemis swag so there's plenty of stuff there are t-shirts and things like that you can still get the astronaut ice cream which is always the most popular thing in the gift shop but we do have quite a bit of Artemis swag you can get it in person or online a lot of excitement around this thing when we're going back to the moon. All right and one other quick question are you still on a reservation basis there at the museum especially during Cherry Blossom Festival it's nuts and I remember I went there just on the fly and we couldn't get in because of all of the various issues there what's it like right now? Yeah that's great to point out we do have a reservation system and during the summer especially this season I highly recommend booking your tickets ahead of time they're free available online but we have this reservation system because we've been renovating the museum over the past several years and there's a lot of interest and enthusiasm and we want to make sure that if you're in the museum you have a great experience and it's not just too crowded so we are limiting the number of people coming through the museum so just plan ahead it's not so hard to get those tickets but you often have to plan a few days in advance in the peak season. Thank you so much for joining us we're very excited you'll listen the museum is celebrating its 50th anniversary this year it opened July 1st 1976 which of course was the bicentennial year so here we go with the 50th anniversary in our 250th anniversary of the country nothing better than a good visit to the Air and Space Museum on our National Mall. Y'all live in Washington DC people travel all over the world to come here it's right in your backyard don't take it for granted get out there and check out our Air and Space Museum thank you so much for joining us appreciate it. Thank you. It is 844. I'm sorry if you think about it there are people out there who still believe we landed on the moon anyway. All kinds of people. Upside gains any type of ownership stake or ownership potential that's the money remember you can afford anything just not everything afford anything follow and listen on your favorite platform. I think I'll explain if you think about it that there are people out there who still believe we landed on the moon anyway. All kinds of questions out there. I love that that was your question. That was. So how much do you have to deal with the conspiracy theorists in the news business. No your question to the museum. Oh yeah yeah no that's true. Oh no we get it all the time. I love that you're like open up the collar. I was filling in for Mark Levin the night of the launch this week Wednesday night and I was going on because it happened in the first hour of the show and you got to cover the news obviously there's a lot going on in politics but this is a once in a you know lifetime event that's going on so we covered it in the first hour and I got people tweeting at me I can't believe you're wasting Mark Levin showtime talking about this thing everyone knows this is fake everyone knows that it's it's a distraction from the Epstein files. Yes yes we're launching a rocket that was planned years ago to go to the moon because we're distracting from the Epstein file story. Yeah I know when you bring up conspiracy theories I just feel like they're all like when you bring up Epstein in the moon like that's just so many there so much there. Of course we just did half an hour on building bunkers in your backyard so who are we. True well I learned a lot though. All right so this is a great story if you're traveling this weekend you know when you're in the airport you often hear announcements from TSA and from flight attendants or from the people at the gate about lost and found and various things and every town has a little idiosyncratic difference to them right in terms of stuff that you're going to hear. Here in Washington DC there's stuff that you will only hear in Washington DC apparently somebody posted on social media it's a it's a great account to follow by the way it's called Overheard District Overheard WDC it just quotes things that you over here when you're in Washington whether you're at a bar standing in line at Metro just stuff that's very DC. Here was the announcement at Reagan Airport yesterday if you recently went through the South Security checkpoint and are missing your copy of the Declaration of Independence please come pick it up. Now I assume they mean one of those souvenir versions of the declaration that you could buy but people immediately leapt to the conclusion that you know we got a national treasure situation going on here. Yeah like one of those somebody somebody left their theft from the archives they didn't pack it properly. Exactly exactly it was basically a scene from National Treasure 3 that's being shot right then and there. By the way I was just at Reagan Airport yesterday. Cherry blossoms everywhere I mean you need to buy cherry blossom swag or whatever just go to the airport and you'll get plenty one stop shopping hardly any lines. It's probably much less crowded than the actual cherry blossom festival. I didn't go this year but I've been in the past and I had people reach out to me and ask me like where's the best place to put a blanket down and just sit and I was like not near the tidal base. I don't want to like die exactly it's like it's the whole scene I said it's basically like salmon swimming you know what I mean like you basically just keep moving. It was to be honest I did not enjoy I go during like a weekday during work hours other like the weekend is just it's my daughter and I made the mistake one year thinking that we could just ride bikes through the that would be safer though than sitting on a blanket. That's true that's true by the way one other thing that I noticed at Reagan Airport. How one of the things that we were going to tell us about was a little how the TSA were doing. Oh TSA was great yesterday no problem. So it wasn't too crowded beautiful. That's good when I was traveling previously to just like to and from CPAC it was I mean I think I walked through security in five minutes. Yeah yeah Dallas was fine. Yeah absolutely. One thing that I've noticed and I've noticed this all year unlike Trump's first term where the only kind of swag you would get at the gift shops at the Reagan Airport were you know snarky anti-Trump t-shirts and hats right like is America great yet or you know I voted for her and the things like that together right right there's now Trump's second term there is a ton of that's true it is replete with Magistuff and by the way it's sincere it's not yes and and ton of Magaturas coming to Washington to celebrate their president the man that they voted for and that is a distinct difference here in the second term than the first term. They need more mugshot t-shirts yeah I think that's one of my favorites. By the way just real fast as we talk about the people who don't think we went to the moon and thought it was a conspiracy and thought it was a distraction from Epstein or what have you let's not forget a great American who still walks with us still lives with us the last remaining member of the Apollo mission that did in fact go to the moon Apollo 11 he walked on the moon he is a badass he is a true American he is Buzz Aldrin and let's not forget that if you go up to Buzz Aldrin and start challenging him on the moon mission and whether it was faked well you're gonna get a knuckle sandwich remember this just come with me Buzz you really like it there you're the one who said you walked on the moon when you didn't calling the kettle black if ever thought of saying I misrepresented myself you're a coward and a liar and a thief I believe he was like 82 years old when he did that it's pretty amazing honestly Buzz Aldrin's second greatest achievement his first great achievement obviously being a part of the Apollo mission and walking on the moon second greatest achievement punching a reporter I I was wondering I haven't I didn't catch any of the coverage yesterday or the day before but did he has he been weighing in on all this I haven't seen we will check in with Buzz Aldrin I have no doubt that our incredible executive producer Heather Hunter maybe he'll call in next week by the time the Artemis mission is done we will have a guest appearance from Buzz Aldrin and James Tiberius Kirk that's her white whale she wants Bill Shatner on this show that'll be the greatest moment of her life and the cute little kid that just went viral she's got a thing for Shatner it's 8.53 this isn't your average podcast this pod is about to be crazy I don't even know what's gonna happen this is full send it's just like a boy scrap join the party we threw like a spontaneous party out of nowhere it was crazy pranks parties and viral culture at its wildest just seeing like the guys that you brought in and like seeing their different personalities and stuff it's been entertaining dude this could be the greatest content build of all time bro the full send podcast follow and listen on your favorite platform