Security on Higher Alert Across U.S.

Although the Department of Homeland Security has not issued an alert, the agency remains at what the homeland security secretary, Janet Napolitano, has called a “heightened state of vigilance.” The State Department, on the other hand, has issued a worldwide travel alert to Americans.

In Philadelphia, the police commissioner, Charles H. Ramsey, has placed the department on “high alert,” increased patrols around religious buildings, and intensified security at tourist attractions and shopping malls, the police said.

“We haven’t added more personnel; we’re just doing more checks and asking our officers and citizens to be more aware,” said Lt. Ray Evers, a police spokesman.

The additional security includes hourly checks at some of the city’s synagogues and mosques, as well as arranging meetings with building superintendents and representatives of large businesses and manufacturers to remind them to report suspicious activity to the police, Lieutenant Evers said.

In Phoenix, officials said they had supplemented security at the city’s airport, municipal buildings and houses of worship and on its light rail system, said Scott Krushak, the coordinator for Phoenix’s Office of Emergency Management.

“We’re not doing it because we’ve had any threats, but because it is part of a ‘lean forward’ strategy we have here in the city of Phoenix,” Mr. Krushak said. “We are really relying on the community to tell us if they see anything.”

In Los Angeles, the police sent additional officers to the Staples Center for the Lakers playoff basketball game against Dallas on Monday, and officials said they intended to also supplement police patrols at Dodger Stadium. Even before the death of Bin Laden, security at Dodgers games had been stepped up after a fan of the rival San Francisco Giants was badly beaten in a stadium parking lot last month.

In addition, Lt. Andy Neiman, a police spokesman, said the police were paying particular attention to airports, ports and telecommunications hubs.

At Los Angeles International Airport on Tuesday, Debby Cummings, 44, who was on a flight from Detroit to visit friends in Los Angeles, said the security screening in Detroit seemed normal except that more passengers had been told to go through full-body scanners. Ms. Cummings said that she had not been overly concerned about flying, but that her 15-year-old son had worried the plane might explode.

“In Detroit they had two of the body scanners, which they were sending most people through, but other than that it was the same,” she said. “They only had one scanner before, and they didn’t used to make the majority of people go through it.”

In Chicago, the Police Department said it had sent additional officers to patrol around houses of worship, the Richard J. Daley Center, and at the United Center, where arena security personnel checked fans arriving to Monday night’s basketball game against Atlanta with handheld metal detectors.

Similar procedures were to be in place for an N.B.A. playoff game in Oklahoma City on Tuesday night and for all remaining basketball playoff games, officials said.

In Miami, the police have added officers with dogs at Miami International Airport, but many airports around the country, including those in San Francisco and Seattle, said they had taken no additional security precautions because the federal government had not issued a threat warning.

Timothy Williams reported from New York, and Ian Lovett from Los Angeles.

 

Security on Higher Alert Across U.S.

Although the Department of Homeland Security has not issued an alert, the agency remains at what the homeland security secretary, Janet Napolitano, has called a “heightened state of vigilance.” The State Department, on the other hand, has issued a worldwide travel alert to Americans.

In Philadelphia, the police commissioner, Charles H. Ramsey, has placed the department on “high alert,” increased patrols around religious buildings, and intensified security at tourist attractions and shopping malls, the police said.

“We haven’t added more personnel; we’re just doing more checks and asking our officers and citizens to be more aware,” said Lt. Ray Evers, a police spokesman.

The additional security includes hourly checks at some of the city’s synagogues and mosques, as well as arranging meetings with building superintendents and representatives of large businesses and manufacturers to remind them to report suspicious activity to the police, Lieutenant Evers said.

In Phoenix, officials said they had supplemented security at the city’s airport, municipal buildings and houses of worship and on its light rail system, said Scott Krushak, the coordinator for Phoenix’s Office of Emergency Management.

“We’re not doing it because we’ve had any threats, but because it is part of a ‘lean forward’ strategy we have here in the city of Phoenix,” Mr. Krushak said. “We are really relying on the community to tell us if they see anything.”

In Los Angeles, the police sent additional officers to the Staples Center for the Lakers playoff basketball game against Dallas on Monday, and officials said they intended to also supplement police patrols at Dodger Stadium. Even before the death of Bin Laden, security at Dodgers games had been stepped up after a fan of the rival San Francisco Giants was badly beaten in a stadium parking lot last month.

In addition, Lt. Andy Neiman, a police spokesman, said the police were paying particular attention to airports, ports and telecommunications hubs.

At Los Angeles International Airport on Tuesday, Debby Cummings, 44, who was on a flight from Detroit to visit friends in Los Angeles, said the security screening in Detroit seemed normal except that more passengers had been told to go through full-body scanners. Ms. Cummings said that she had not been overly concerned about flying, but that her 15-year-old son had worried the plane might explode.

“In Detroit they had two of the body scanners, which they were sending most people through, but other than that it was the same,” she said. “They only had one scanner before, and they didn’t used to make the majority of people go through it.”

In Chicago, the Police Department said it had sent additional officers to patrol around houses of worship, the Richard J. Daley Center, and at the United Center, where arena security personnel checked fans arriving to Monday night’s basketball game against Atlanta with handheld metal detectors.

Similar procedures were to be in place for an N.B.A. playoff game in Oklahoma City on Tuesday night and for all remaining basketball playoff games, officials said.

In Miami, the police have added officers with dogs at Miami International Airport, but many airports around the country, including those in San Francisco and Seattle, said they had taken no additional security precautions because the federal government had not issued a threat warning.

Timothy Williams reported from New York, and Ian Lovett from Los Angeles.

 

Security on Higher Alert Across U.S.

Although the Department of Homeland Security has not issued an alert, the agency remains at what the homeland security secretary, Janet Napolitano, has called a “heightened state of vigilance.” The State Department, on the other hand, has issued a worldwide travel alert to Americans.

In Philadelphia, the police commissioner, Charles H. Ramsey, has placed the department on “high alert,” increased patrols around religious buildings, and intensified security at tourist attractions and shopping malls, the police said.

“We haven’t added more personnel; we’re just doing more checks and asking our officers and citizens to be more aware,” said Lt. Ray Evers, a police spokesman.

The additional security includes hourly checks at some of the city’s synagogues and mosques, as well as arranging meetings with building superintendents and representatives of large businesses and manufacturers to remind them to report suspicious activity to the police, Lieutenant Evers said.

In Phoenix, officials said they had supplemented security at the city’s airport, municipal buildings and houses of worship and on its light rail system, said Scott Krushak, the coordinator for Phoenix’s Office of Emergency Management.

“We’re not doing it because we’ve had any threats, but because it is part of a ‘lean forward’ strategy we have here in the city of Phoenix,” Mr. Krushak said. “We are really relying on the community to tell us if they see anything.”

In Los Angeles, the police sent additional officers to the Staples Center for the Lakers playoff basketball game against Dallas on Monday, and officials said they intended to also supplement police patrols at Dodger Stadium. Even before the death of Bin Laden, security at Dodgers games had been stepped up after a fan of the rival San Francisco Giants was badly beaten in a stadium parking lot last month.

In addition, Lt. Andy Neiman, a police spokesman, said the police were paying particular attention to airports, ports and telecommunications hubs.

At Los Angeles International Airport on Tuesday, Debby Cummings, 44, who was on a flight from Detroit to visit friends in Los Angeles, said the security screening in Detroit seemed normal except that more passengers had been told to go through full-body scanners. Ms. Cummings said that she had not been overly concerned about flying, but that her 15-year-old son had worried the plane might explode.

“In Detroit they had two of the body scanners, which they were sending most people through, but other than that it was the same,” she said. “They only had one scanner before, and they didn’t used to make the majority of people go through it.”

In Chicago, the Police Department said it had sent additional officers to patrol around houses of worship, the Richard J. Daley Center, and at the United Center, where arena security personnel checked fans arriving to Monday night’s basketball game against Atlanta with handheld metal detectors.

Similar procedures were to be in place for an N.B.A. playoff game in Oklahoma City on Tuesday night and for all remaining basketball playoff games, officials said.

In Miami, the police have added officers with dogs at Miami International Airport, but many airports around the country, including those in San Francisco and Seattle, said they had taken no additional security precautions because the federal government had not issued a threat warning.

Timothy Williams reported from New York, and Ian Lovett from Los Angeles.

 

Japanese Officials on Defensive as Nuclear Alert Level Rises

  A volunteer in Ofunato, Japan, cleaned photographs that were found in the tsunami debris.

TOKYO — Japanese officials struggled through the day on Tuesday to explain why it had taken them a month to disclose large-scale releases of radioactive material in mid-March at a crippled nuclear power plant, as the government and an electric utility disagreed on the extent of continuing problems there.

A policeman watched colleagues prepare to transport a body by van in Minamisoma, Japan, on Thursday, inside a deserted nuclear evacuation zone.

The government announced Tuesday morning that it had raised its rating of the severity of the accident at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station to 7, the worst on an international scale, from 5. Officials said that the reactor had released one-tenth as much radioactive material as the Chernobyl accident in 1986, but still qualified as a 7 according to a complex formula devised by the International Atomic Energy Agency.

Japan’s new assessment was based largely on computer models showing very heavy emissions of radioactive iodine and cesium from March 14 to 16, just after the earthquake and tsunami rendered the plant’s emergency cooling system inoperative. The nearly monthlong delay in acknowledging the extent of these emissions is a fresh example of confused data and analysis from the Japanese, and put the authorities on the defensive about whether they have delayed or blocked the release of information to avoid alarming the public.

Seiji Shiroya, a commissioner of Japan’s Nuclear Safety Commission, an independent government panel that oversees the country’s nuclear industry, said that the government had delayed issuing data on the extent of the radiation releases because of concern that the margins of error had been large in initial computer models. But he also suggested a public policy reason for having kept quiet.

“Some foreigners fled the country even when there appeared to be little risk,” he said. “If we immediately decided to label the situation as Level 7, we could have triggered a panicked reaction.”

The Japanese media, which has a reputation for passivity but has become more aggressive in response to public unhappiness about the nuclear accident, questioned government leaders through the day about what the government knew about the accident and when it knew it.

Prime Minister Naoto Kan gave a nationally televised speech and press conference in the early evening to call for national rebuilding, but ended up defending his government’s handling of information about the accident.

“What I can say for the information I obtained — of course the government is very large, so I don’t have all the information — is that no information was ever suppressed or hidden after the accident,” he said. “There are various ways of looking at this, and I know there are opinions saying that information could have been disclosed faster. However, as the head of the government, I never hid any information because it was inconvenient for us.”

Junichi Matsumoto, a senior nuclear power executive from the plant’s operator, the Tokyo Electric Power Company, fanned public fears about radiation when he said at a separate news conference on Tuesday morning that the radiation release from Daiichi could, in time, surpass levels seen in 1986.

“The radiation leak has not stopped completely, and our concern is that it could eventually exceed Chernobyl,” Mr. Matsumoto said.

But Hidehiko Nishiyama, deputy director general of Japan’s nuclear regulator, the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency, said in an interview on Tuesday evening that he did not know how the company had come up with its estimate. “I cannot understand their position,” he said.

He speculated that Tokyo Electric was being “prudent and thinking about the worst-case scenario,” adding, “I think they don’t want to be seen as optimistic.”

Mr. Nishiyama said that his agency did not expect another big escape of radiation from Daiichi, saying that “almost all” the material that is going to escape has already come out. He said that the rate of radiation release had peaked in the early days after the March 11 earthquake, and that the rate of radiation had dropped by 90 percent since then.

The peak release in emissions of radioactive particles took place following hydrogen explosions at three reactors, as technicians desperately tried to pump in seawater to keep the uranium fuel rods cool, and bled radioactive gas from the reactors in order to make room for the seawater.

Mr. Nishiyama took pains to say — and other nuclear experts agreed — that the Japanese accident posed fewer health risks than Chernobyl.

 

Police defend Newry alert cordon

 11 April 2011 Last updated at 05:37 ET Hundreds of motorists drove past the van containing the bomb on Friday after cones cordoning it off were removed A senior police officer has defended the PSNI's handing of a security alert in Newry, which led to the discovery of a 500lb bomb.

The PSNI were criticised after hundreds of motorists drove past the van containing the bomb after cones cordoning it off were removed.

Chief Superintendent Alasdair Robinson said a full cordon was put in place when the suspect vehicle was located.

He said police were hampered by two "ambiguous" bomb warnings.

Mr Robinson said they had hindered their search for the bomb.

"No location"

"The warning came in to a local charity and it said the following: 'This is the IRA, there is a bomb under the underpass'," he said.

"No location was given and there was nine seconds of recording.

"The previous one, the first one said: 'This is the IRA, we've planted a bomb on the underpass at the Berliss Road and it is to go off in 45 minutes'.

"Now there is no Berliss Road on the M1. The M1 goes from Belfast to the west.

"The M1 of course, is the A1 / M1 which is the national north south route, so that was the level of ambiguity."

He said police did not at that stage know where the bomb was.

"It wasn't until almost an hour later that we could confirm that we had a suspect vehicle. At that point, we put a full cordon in place," he added.

Police cordon breached

"We closed the roads, both with police and the Roads Service, who kindly helped us with that. We had the whole scene completely secure and locked down for the evening."

Chief Superintendent Robinson said some members of the public had "breached" the police cordon.

"You can't blame all of the people who drove past because they came to what they thought was an open road," he said.

"We checked the cordon and we put police back in to close them down."

He said the PSNI would review their use of signage.

"It is not part of anyone's plan to allow any member of the public to go anywhere near what was a suspect device.

"Sophisticated and substantial"

"The police were on the ground but as far as we were concerned the cordon was complete."

Police said the bomb, which was left on the Belfast to Dublin road, was "sophisticated and substantial".

The Secretary of State Owen Paterson said the community was "fed up" with the recent spate of alerts and condemned the incident.

However, he refused to be drawn on how the police dealt with the bomb and said police handling of the security alert was an "operational matter."

"There are questions that need to be answered and I will put them to the chief constable and the justice minister when I meet with them next week," Mr Paterson said.

"I am not going to comment until I have spoken to them."

Acting Policing Board chairman Brian Rea said the police had done all they could to make the area safe.

"I had a briefing on Sunday from the district commander in the area who reassured me they were doing all in their power to keep that road closed," he said.

"The police operate in that area under a constant threat. We have heard in the past where a device has been planted as a come on or trap.

"Police have to be extremely careful when they enter into this type of situation and often they have to leave it some time before it is safe for them to do so."

The alert, which started on Thursday night, was less than a week since the murder of PSNI constable Ronan Kerr in Omagh, County Tyrone.

Police believe that the van containing the bomb was abandoned in the underpass because of increased police activity in the wake of the murder last Saturday.

Army bomb experts carried out several controlled explosions on the vehicle on Friday night.