'It's dangerous:' McLean-based security firm help with Israel evacuations amid Hamas' attacks

MCLEAN, Va. (7News) — For several days, McLean-based security firm Global Guardian has been transporting and evacuating hundreds of people out of Israel.

“It’s tenuous,” said Global Guardian CEO Dale Buckner. “There’s, as you can imagine, vehicles that have been blown up; there’s infrastructure that has been disrupted; buildings have fallen over. So, it’s dangerous.”

Despite the danger, Buckner said his company has already helped about 600 people flee from the conflict through 16 evacuations.

Many have been carried out on the ground by driving evacuees to the country’s borders.

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The others have been able to get out through commercial and chartered flights.

“We have two more ground missions scheduled in the next 16 hours and two more aircrafts going out in the next 24 hours either to Cyprus or Europe,” Buckner said Wednesday afternoon.

That timing is crucial because Global Guardian expects the war to intensify soon.

“We are moving people with armed agents, armored vehicles, soft-skin vehicles around Israel to main airports, and also we are going to the Jordanian border,” Buckner said. “There is a border access through the West Bank."

The company is helping its usual clients, the pharmaceutical companies, banks and government contractors that hire them to help them travel and work abroad.

However, they have also been helping several American families that were in the West Bank, Americans visiting families across Israel as well as school groups and tourists that found themselves in the middle of the conflict.

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To anyone on the fence about evacuating now, Buckner’s message is clear.

“This is not going to be normalized in a week or so, it is urgent,” Buckner said. “We do believe once Israel goes into Gaza we could lose the availability of the air space completely. No flights at all.”

“At that point, all you have is border crossing to Jordan and that also could get shut down, and once that shuts down, there is no way out,” Buckner added.

Buckner said he believes the conflict will persist and could spread throughout the entire region. However, he said the evacuations will continue for as long as possible.