'Pagers' Deployed in Dirty Bomb Scare
Jan. 7 -- Federal officials sent teams of scientists and more than 1,000 radiation-detection "pagers" to local police forces in several big cities out of concern that al Qaeda terrorists would try to explode a "dirty bomb" during the New Year's holiday festivities, ABCNEWS has learned.
On Dec. 21 — the same day the government raised the nation's terror alert level to "high" — the Department of Homeland Security sent a bulletin to local law enforcement agencies warning that detonating a dirty bomb was "a top al Qaeda objective."
Officials were concerned that al Qaeda members were focused on stealing or producing chemical, biological, radiological or nuclear materials to possibly produce a dirty bomb, the bulletin warned. Such bombs use conventional explosives to scatter radioactive material over a wide area.
"The problem with a dirty bomb is not that it will kill a lot of people, but that it will scare a lot of people," said ABCNEWS consultant Dick Clarke. "A dirty bomb is a pure terror weapon designed to cause panic [and] collapse in economic markets."
The extraordinary measures were taken because intelligence from multiple sources indicated al Qaeda members were preparing an assault more devastating than the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, senior administration sources told ABCNEWS.
There was no specific dirty bomb threat, sources said, but government officials planned for a worst-case scenario.
In anticipation of possible radiological or dirty bomb attacks, the Department of Homeland Security sent more than 1,000 radiation-detection devices, known as pagers, to police in Seattle, Detroit, Atlanta and Houston because of the expected large New Year's Eve crowds in those cities.
Batches of radiation pagers were also flown to authorities monitoring festivities at the Rose Bowl in Pasadena, Calif., and the Sugar Bowl in New Orleans. The hope, sources said, was that police on routine patrol at these events would carry the devices and be alerted at the first sign of any radiation.
