Volume 2
Issue 16
- Safety News
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<Back 
Wednesday, March 12,
2003
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- CIA Spooks Neighbors
- Shoulder fire missiles may become the new threat to taking off or landing passenger jets in our major cities. Anti-terrorism agents have been sent to
airports in 80 cities to gauge the vulnerability of low-flying
passenger planes to the threat of shoulder-fired missiles.
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- The agents are very
concerned that terrorists in public areas such as cemeteries and forest
preserves could shoot down low flying airliners. The agents are also looking at
access to high rise office buildings which could also be used to shoot down
planes. After inspections, experts will develop protection for each
airport, which could include anti-missile technology that detects a missile and
interferes with a rocket's guidance system, causing it to veer off target.
Homeland Security officials will not reveal any information about such threats
in the United States but terrorists tried without success to use shoulder-fired
missiles to shoot down an American fighter jet in Saudi Arabia last May and an
Israeli airliner in Kenya in November. "There's a concern that terrorists could
effectively use these weapons to bring down commercial aircraft" in the U.S., said Ross Rice, FBI
spokesman.
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- New York State Police Cars Can Be Death Traps
- The Crown Victoria cars used by the New York State Police may be fiery death traps for officers involved in crashes.
Inspectors suspect that Ford dealerships improperly installed shields designed to prevent them from erupting in flames when rear-ended.
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- State troopers last week found the shields, which are supposed to prevent bolts in the rear axle and suspension from penetrating the gas tank, were not properly installed in 25 percent of the cars belonging to Troop E, based in Rochester. The discovery led to inspections of all retrofitted Crown Victorias in the 800-car fleet at the State Police maintenance facility in Poughkeepsie. New York state lawmakers are looking into other dangers the cars threaten officers with.
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- Airline Missile Terror
- It is easy to get spooked when your next door neighbor is the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). A strange sound in the night may mean the agency is having a new air conditioner put in or is testing one of those flying saucers the tabloids claim the CIA has.
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- That tension between the government agency and the residents living near the CIA Langley, VA headquarters is why the agency has hand-delivered postcards to homes near the fence that encloses its headquarters. The cards give phone numbers to call if neighbors have questions about activities or odd sounds emanating from the bosky CIA campus. "There are lots of houses that are adjacent to our fence line or close to it. Sometimes they see and hear things that gets them nervous," describes CIA spokesman Bill Harlow. The only question the cards do not answer is who is the Marie who signs the cards.
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THE END
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