Law-enforcement officials closed Interstate 65 north of Birmingham, AL, for two hours Tuesday, March 25, after they stopped a truck and a police dog alerted them to the possible presence of explosives.
However, despite the extreme measures taken, officials determined there was no danger to the public or problem with the truck, and released the driver and his vehicle.
Jeff Fuqua, a spokesman for the Birmingham Field Office of the FBI, said federal authorities received information that the tag on the truck had been altered. FBI officials informed the Birmingham Police, who pulled the truck over on I-65 just north of the I-59 interchange.
After the police dog alerted an officer to the possible presence of explosives – about 11:30 a.m. – officials closed off the highway, diverting traffic onto other area roads. The closure lasted about two hours.
Photos of the incident showed officers checking every surface on the truck, opening the back door and even opening the hood at one point. The gray cargo container the truck was hauling was empty – only an oily substance was found in the container – and the driver was released with only a minor traffic citation, for driving with an altered tag, Fuqua said.
“Some samples were taken from around the rear doors just to be on the safe side, and they were going to send them off, just to be sure,” he said.
Joining local police in the search were officials of the Gardendale, AL, Police Department and the Secret Service. Media outlets reported that officials from Alabama Department of Homeland Security and the federal Homeland Security Department were also on the scene.
WVTM-TV reported the container, owned by a New Jersey company, originated in Indonesia, where it had been loaded with wood furniture. It arrived at the port of Tacoma, WA, where a company called Bare Cartage picked it up and hauled it to Chicago.
The side of the chassis rail had the words “Evergreen America” hand-written on it – the name of the New Jersey company that owns it, according to WVTM. The truck’s door carried the name Fort Dearborn Trucking Co. It is not known at this point how the container became attached to the Fort Dearborn truck, or why it was in Alabama empty.
Indonesia – the country where the initial load in the container originated – is the home of Jemaah Islamiyah, which the U.S. government says is a terrorist organization known to have cells operating in Southeast Asia and which has connections to al-Qaida. The State Department also recently released a travel warning advising U.S. citizens to avoid travel to the Southeast Asian nation.
However, Fuqua said he was not aware of any suspected connection between the incident and the container’s original cargo or its point of origin.
“This whole thing originated because of that tag,” Fuqua said.
“We didn’t even have FBI personnel on the scene. We made the calls and it kind of went from there. It just spun out of control once the traffic stop was made.”
The Alabama incident was not the first time in recent days that officials have reacted with extreme caution regarding trucks and the areas they frequent.
The exit ramps off Interstate 5 at Canyonville, OR, were shut down this weekend after a suspicious package was found at the Seven Feathers Travel Center. A shuttle bus driver found metal cylinders inside, and the state’s bomb squad was called. However, the cylinders turned out to be parts for a lighthouse, and the situation quickly returned to normal.
In addition, federal officials are still searching for a Fruehauf fuel-oil tank trailer that disappeared from a South Jersey truck terminal in April. The situation is potentially serious because terrorists can turn such tanks into bombs, similar to ones used in bombings in the Middle East and other locations.
FBI spokeswoman Linda Vizi said authorities had received no threats or direct reports relating to the missing tank trailer. However, they are concerned that about the same time it was reported missing, that chemicals were taken from Eastern Concrete Materials in Bogota, NJ. The chemical is used to prevent corrosion of steel supports inside poured concrete, but can be combined with other agents to concoct a bomb like the one used to blow up the federal building in Oklahoma City.
Federal officials in the past have released several warnings about the danger of trucks being used as bombs in a terrorist attack. In addition, federal officials have warned that al Qaida is planning a major attack on the United States sometime between Memorial Day and the presidential election in November, according to media reports.
--by Mark H. Reddig, associate editor
Mark Reddig can be reached at mark_reddig@landlinemag.com.
