"Authorities were looking for about 13 other packages shipped from Yemen, a law enforcement source said. Some of them have been found and an investigation of those has not indicated they are a threat, the source said."*The sender wants to see which packages get detected, where and when.
"I believe the residents and politicians fully understand the risk of ignition is small, even minor. But if there were no risk, the Coast Guard would not be taking such extreme safety measures.posted by ericb at 1:04 PM on October 29, 2010
MIT Professor, LNG expert and former chair of MassPort, James Fay, explains the risk ... citing the USS Cole terrorist attack in 2000. 'There’s no doubt that with a big enough bomb you can blow a hole in the side of the vessel and the cargo will burn,' Fay said. 'It’s well understood that for the big fires we’re talking about that distances like half a mile or so, you can get second-degree burns to exposed skin in about 30 seconds.'
... Beyond public safety in such a densely populated area, there are also a significant quality-of-life issues for the surrounding North End/Charlestown/East Boston neighborhoods. When an LNG tanker comes through the harbor, public access in the harbor and on the waterfront is harshly impeded."
"At 930 feet long, the Inigo Tapias is one of the largest ships to do business in the harbor. Stood on end, it would dwarf the city’s tallest building, the 750-foot John Hancock tower. And its cargo is certainly the most menacing.Photos: Inigo Tapias || John Hancock Tower.
Every few days, tankers like this one carry 33 million gallons of liquefied natural gas to a plant in Everett. They pass within a few hundred yards of downtown Boston and Logan Airport ..."
Even on his example - quad's exist on the backside.Also dude, you are not really making all that much sense here. It obviously could be a phone and probably is.
" ... Several U.S. officials said they were increasingly confident that al-Qaida's Yemen branch, the group behind the failed Detroit airliner bombing last Christmas, was responsible.posted by ericb at 6:40 AM on October 30, 2010 [1 favorite]
A Yemeni security official said the new investigation involved about 26 suspected packages.
... Authorities were questioning cargo workers at the airport as well as employees of the local shipping companies contracted to work with FedEx and UPS, the official said.
Some had left Yemen and others were still in the country, he said, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to release information.
Authorities were questioning cargo workers at the airport as well as employees of the local shipping companies contracted to work with FedEx and UPS, the official said.
In Dubai, where one of the two bombs was found in a FedEx shipment from Yemen, police said it contained PETN, a powerful industrial explosive, and bore the hallmarks of al-Qaida.
The white powder explosives were discovered in the ink cartridge of a computer printer, said a police statement carried by the official state news agency WAM.
'The parcel was prepared in a professional way where a closed electrical circuit was connected to a mobile phone SIM card hidden inside the printer' the statement said.
'This tactic carries the hallmarks of methods used previously by terrorist organizations such as al-Qaida,' it added.
The bomb also contained lead azide, which is used in detonators. Dubai police experts defused the device, the statement said.
The device was rigged to an electric circuit, and a mobile phone chip was hidden inside the printer, the statement said.
The New York Times reported that Representative Jane Harman, a member of the House Homeland Security Committee, had said the package sent via the U.K. had a timer as a detonator.
... There are only a handful of international shipping locations in the impoverished Arab nation, but U.S. officials worried that record keeping would be sparse and investigators would have to rely more on intelligence sources to identify the would-be bombers.
... Intelligence officials were onto the suspected plot for days, officials said. The packages in England and Dubai were discovered after Saudi Arabian intelligence picked up information related to Yemen and passed it on to the U.S., two officials said.
Most of the officials spoke on condition of anonymity, citing the ongoing investigation.
U.S. intelligence officials warned last month that terrorists hoped to mail chemical and biological materials as part of an attack on the United States and other Western countries. The alert came in a Sept. 23 bulletin from the Homeland Security Department obtained by The Associated Press.
Since the failed Christmas bombing, Yemen has been a focus for U.S. counter-terrorism officials. Before that attack, the U.S. regarded al-Qaida's branch there as primarily a threat in the region, not to the United States.
Authorities believe about 300 al-Qaida members operate in Yemen." *
"John O. Brennan, the president’s top counterterrorism adviser, said that the packages containing explosives, which he compared in size to a 'breadbox,' were undergoing forensic analysis and that the inquiry was at an early stage. He said investigators did not yet know how the explosives were intended to be activated."*posted by ericb at 6:57 AM on October 30, 2010
"The Daily Telegraph, a newspaper with close contacts in the security agencies, reported in its Saturday editions that the plot was discovered 'after a tipoff' to an MI6 agent 'responsible for Yemen.'posted by ericb at 7:06 AM on October 30, 2010
MI6 is the popular term for Britain’s Secret Intelligence Service, the country’s foreign intelligence agency. A spokesman at the Foreign Office, responsible for MI6, refused to comment on the report when he was reached by telephone on Saturday.
The careful wording of the Telegraph report suggested the MI6 official may have been based at Britain’s embassy in Sanaa, the Yemeni capital.
The embassy, like the American mission in Sanaa, has been the target of several terrorist attacks, including an ambush earlier this month in which a rocket-propelled grenade was fired at a convoy of vehicles moving through rush-hour traffic in Sanaa that was carrying Britain’s deputy ambassador and four other diplomats. One of the diplomats was lightly injured, according to an official statement in London."
"British Home Secretary Theresa May confirmed on Saturday that the other potentially deadly package, intercepted at a small airport near the city of Birmingham, 'did contain explosive material.' The British government’s emergency committee, which goes by name COBRA met yesterday, she said, and would reconvene today to review security measures."*posted by ericb at 7:10 AM on October 30, 2010
"Yemeni authorities on Saturday arrested a woman thought to be involved in sending explosive packages headed to the United States and were searching for more suspects belived linked to al-Qaida, Yemeni security officials said.posted by ericb at 12:40 PM on October 30, 2010
The arrest came after authorities surrounded a house where she was hiding in the capital San'a, Reuters reported.
A security official told Reuters that authorities traced the woman through a telephone number she left with a cargo company.
Authorities were looking for a male accomplice, NBC News reported.
Yemeni officials told The Associated Press authorities were searching for a number of suspects believed to have used forged documents and ID cards that played a role in the plot that was thwarted Friday.
Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh earlier told reporters that the United States and the United Arab Emirates provided him with information that identified the woman as a suspect."
"Yemen on Sunday freed a woman held on suspicion of involvement in a plot to send parcel bombs on U.S.-bound planes after her arrest sparked protests by her fellow students.posted by ericb at 1:03 PM on October 31, 2010
'Another woman had used her name and ID. Authorities are looking for that woman,' the government official said.
.. Yemeni police late on Sunday released Hanan al Samawi, 22, a female computer engineering student suspected of mailing the packages. She was detained Saturday after her telephone number appeared on one of the packages.
Police said the release was conditional and she could still be taken in for further questioning."
The toner cartridges were filled with the odorless military grade plastic explosive pentaerythritol tetranitrate (PETN), a white powder that is one of the most powerful explosives known. The bomb found in England contained 400 grams (14 oz) of PETN, five times the amount needed to level a house. The one found in Dubai contained 300 grams (11 oz) of PETN.Parcel Bombs Could Rip 50 Planes in Half.
By comparison, the bomb in the terrorist suspect's underwear in the attempted 2009 Christmas Day bombing contained only about 80 grams (3 oz) of PETN. Hans Michels, professor of safety engineering at University College London, said that just 6 grams (0.2 oz) of PETN—around 50 times less than was used—would be enough to blow a hole in a metal plate twice the thickness of an aircraft's skin."
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