An 84-page grant request submitted to the federal government in March says the port at Long Beach, CA, has a number of security problems that make it vulnerable to a possible terrorist attack, The Orange County Register reported recently.

The report pointed specifically to containers delivered by tractor-trailers, which it says are susceptible to terrorist infiltration, the paper said. The port could be in danger from weapons of mass destruction loaded inside the United States because it has no efficient system for screening cargo containers that enter the port from land.

"That is a weak link," Noel Cunningham, chief of police for the adjacent Port of Los Angeles, told The Register. "We do know that there are terrorist sympathizers and cells inside our country that could choose to attack us from within."

Port officials requested $2.5 million from the federal government to study a container-screening system to check truck loads, but the project wasn't funded.

But the top concern cited in the study is the nearly 4.5 million cargo containers that arrive each year by freighter. Customs officers examine the records of each ship and physically inspect 2 percent of containers. Inspecting more would disrupt trade, officials said.

The paper said customs did receive additional officers and equipment to improve its surveillance of containers arriving from overseas.

The side-by-side Long Beach and Los Angeles ports together handle 43 percent of the nation's container cargo traffic, The Associated Press reported.