Border Travelers Checks For Nukes

Federal inspectors are checking all travelers arriving in the United States for radiation as part of an expanded effort to screen for terrorist activity, a Customs official said Saturday.

Dean Boyd, a spokesman for the new Bureau of Customs and Border Protection, said inspectors began using small, pager-like detectors Saturday at U.S. ports of entry to check passengers for radiation. He said the inspectors, who ask incoming travelers for their passports, carry the detectors on their belts.

"If a source of radiation passes close by or within a certain distance, the pager will begin beeping or alerting, and you can look down at the pager and see the amount (of radiation) that the pager is picking up," Boyd said.

The New York Times, which first reported the expanded screening program, describes it as the most important in a series of counter-terrorism measures that are being put into place as the Customs Service, the Immigration and Naturalization Service and 18 other federal agencies formally merge into the new Department of Homeland Security on Saturday.

Some people entering the United States are already screened for radioactive materials when they walk or drive past border checkpoints where customs agents are carrying portable radiation detectors. That program was begun by the Customs Service after the Sept. 11 terror attacks.

But beginning this weekend, officials told the Times, the detectors will be distributed and used far more widely, which should guarantee that all people entering the United States at the nation's airports, seaports and land borders — an estimated 500,000 people a day — will be screened for radioactive materials. Inspectors who check passports at the arrival gates will carry them.

"We think this is an important way of improving our capability of detecting radiological materials, including dirty bombs and the material that could be used to make a dirty bomb," Customs Commissioner Robert Bonner said to the Times. His title will soon change to commissioner of the Bureau of Customs and Border Protection in the new Homeland Security Department.

Passengers may not notice the devices because inspectors do not have to sweep passengers with them to detect radiation. The pagers simply beep or vibrate to let inspectors know when something radiological is nearby.

The government was using just 4,000 of the pagers before the Sept. 11 attacks but officials distributed more of the devices this weekend, bringing the total to 7,000.

The pagers cost about $2,500 each. Boyd said officials hope to distribute more of them so that all 9,000 Customs inspectors will carry them.

Government auditors warned lawmakers in October that the pagers' range is too limited to be effective. Boyd said officials know all technology has its limits.

"The pagers - they are not a silver bullet. They are one piece of technology that we use, and we use a broad range of technologies to detect radiation," he said.

The detectors can be set off by low levels, such as by patients undergoing chemotherapy or someone who recently had an X-ray. Potassium in bananas could also set it off.

As a backup, Boyd said a few hundred of the inspectors have hand-held devices called "isotope identifiers," which signal what the radioactive material is.

"It allows us to determine whether it's a nuclear bomb or components for a dirty bomb," Boyd said.

The government has other equipment to check for radiological weapons, such as special monitors that screen trucks. Even though Customs officials hope to have 400 of them operating in less than a year, government auditors have said it will take years to get the equipment working properly and to train users.

The government also has 200 vans equipped with gamma ray machines that act like giant X-ray equipment for checking cargo containers.