|
Charleston hosts Homeland Security pilot programs
By Shelia Watson
Contributing Writer
The success of the Project Seahawk pilot program in Charleston, now in its fourth year and the focus of two bills in Congress that will expand the program across the nation, has paved the way for two other pilot projects in the area.
Both pilot projects are centered around detecting and preventing terrorism, which was the focus of ThinkTEC’s annual Homeland Security Innovation Conference held last month at the Space and Naval Warfare Systems Command in North Charleston.
The Southern Regional Radiological Pilot Program and the Southeast Transportation Corridor Pilot Program are based on collaborative models such as Project Seahawk, with a consortium of federal, state and local agencies tasked with providing an integrated operation to improve port security.
“Seahawk is a model nationwide,” said Frank Gutierrez, deputy director of the Project Seahawk Task Force. “There are 354 ports, and a lot of folks responsible for those ports have come here to see how we’re working together and what they can take and emulate in their local environments.”
The SRRPP, designed as a test bed for the National Radiological Pilot Program, will procure, install and deploy radiation sensors in an integrated operational environment within Charleston harbor and its vicinity. Working in close cooperation with Project Seahawk and the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s Domestic Nuclear Detection Office, SRRPP will add an additional layer to the “defense in depth” strategy envisioned through Project Seahawk.
Gutierrez spoke at the Homeland Security Innovation Conference about the importance of Charleston as the location for the pilot programs.
“Charleston is a significant port,” he said. “With millions of containers coming into the port every year, most of them from foreign countries, the (large number of) truck movements, plus the Naval Weapons Station with the capacity to handle 62 million pounds of explosives and the Air Force 437th and 315th (Air Wing Commands) with a number of flights per day—all this means Charleston remains of interest to terrorists.
“Remember, Osama bin Laden owned several ships, which he bought specifically to be used for terror purposes.”
Gutierrez pointed out that everything from bombs to smuggled commodities could move through the port destined for other cities.
“Within 24 hours a container could be halfway across the nation, to literally any city,” he said.
Robert Quinn, director of Port & Maritime Security Programs at Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Oak Ridge, Tenn., which is working on technology for Project Seahawk, also spoke at the conference on the integrated detection systems offered in the pilot programs.
“The Southern Regional Radiological Pilot Program is used to detect nuclear and radiological materials as well as radiological dispersal devices like ‘dirty bombs’ and weapons of mass destruction,” Quinn said. “The sources of a lot of the radiological materials are the former Soviet Union countries, and so it’s possible for terrorists to get their hands on it. We need to plan around the potential that they have it.”
Quinn also noted the significance of location.
“Charleston is potentially a final target, here at the Naval brig, the Air Force base,” Quinn said. “It’s the sixth largest port in the country. We’re a target.”
The second pilot program, the Southeastern Transportation Corridor Pilot Program, was designed to help combat such terrorist threats on the highways. In October, the Domestic Nuclear Detection Office awarded $3.2 million in grants for the deployment of fixed, handheld and mobile radiation detection systems at interstate weigh stations throughout the Southeastern United States. A demonstration was held in November involving the Port of Charleston and several neighboring states.
“The Southeast transportation corridor sees some of the largest concentrations of truck traffic in the country,” DNDO Director Vayl S. Oxford said when the grant was awarded. “The work that we are doing in the Southeast will ultimately lead to a web of radiation detection systems on our nation’s highways.”
The Southeast Transportation Corridor program will integrate existing and new systems and develop a regional threat detection and interdiction architecture. DNDO will provide training for state and local partners on equipment operations, alarm resolution protocols, information sharing and the shipment of radioactive materials from nearby nuclear production and waste treatment facilities.
The grant and the demonstration represent the first phase of the two-year Southeast Transportation program, which eventually will involve federal, state and local governments in nine states and the District of Columbia in the development of nuclear and radiological detection capabilities on the nation’s highways.
“This is a first of its kind, and a lot of eyes are on us here in Charleston,” Quinn said. “This will become a model for the nation.”
Cooperation is key to the success of the pilot programs.
“We know now as a result of 9/11, Katrina, Rita, even the tsunami, when these events occur, one jurisdiction’s capacity to respond and recover is quickly outstripped,” said Marcus Pollock, a program specialist with the Department of Homeland Security.
Pollock spoke at the conference on the National Preparedness Goal, an initiative designed to determine the country’s capability to prevent, protect against, respond to and recover from major events and to minimize their impact on lives, property and the economy. The pilot programs will play a significant role in the National Preparedness Goal.
“The National Preparedness Goal is a vision of where we’re headed and the priorities we have to set,” Pollock said. “It’s a capabilities-based approach.”
The NPG has considered 15 scenarios, from nuclear detonation to chemical attack to natural disasters to cyber attacks, using a systematic approach to determine what would be needed to deal with those scenarios.
“We ended up with a 600-page ‘holy grail’ and the groups we gave it to said, ‘OK, what do you want us to do with it?’ And so we came up with universal task lists of things that can be done in various locations and jurisdictions to help prepare,” he said.
Pollock noted that collaboration goes beyond governmental agencies and includes private-sector and non-governmental partners as well as the general public.
“It’s a shared responsibility, and in the business community there is potential for growth,” Pollock said. “The business community that’s working in this industry stands to grow by about 50 percent.”
|
E-Mail This Article
Printer-Friendly Version