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Strategies & Market Trends : VOLTAIRE'S PORCH-MODERATED -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Dealer who wrote (43885)	11/5/2001 12:18:48 AM
From: Dealer	Respond to of 65232

Fake Coast Guard boat puts chemical plants on alert Saturday November 3, 2001 By The Associated Press Security teams at several area chemical plants have been warned to take extra precautions after a boat masquerading as a Coast Guard vessel was seen on the Kanawha River. "They should do whatever is necessary to protect the facility if the boat approaches at high speed,'' said Lt. Renee Kern, chief of port operations for the Coast Guard's Huntington office. "We left the decision entirely up to them whether to move vessels in the way, or to shoot, or to use a crane, or whatever,'' Kern said. Coast Guard officials called the five largest chemical and energy plants in the area Oct. 5 and warned them that the boat had been spotted on the Kanawha River near Charleston. The five are considered at the highest level of risk among the chemical and power stations located in the Kanawha Valley. Kern didn't identify the plants. The Coast Guard was given increased authority to secure area chemical and energy facilities following the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. Of the more than 30 chemicals federal authorities say have the potential for mass destruction in large containers, 28 are manufactured in West Virginia. The phony Coast Guard boat was spotted at least four times on the Kanawha River between Charleston and Point Pleasant from Oct. 5 and Oct. 20. A State Police trooper also recalled seeing the boat on a trailer traveling north on W.Va. 2 between Huntington and Point Pleasant on Oct. 18. At the time the trooper did not know the boat was suspicious. In the river the boat was seen "lurking around power plants and chemical facilities'' or moving at high speeds, Kern said. A boat matching a similar description was seen in late September on the Ohio River near Cincinnati, said Lt. Cmdr. Paul Mehler, executive officer of the Coast Guard office in Louisville. In an Oct. 11 letter sent to 48 area chemical and energy plants, Coast Guard Lt. Cmdr. Steven Wischmann of Huntington described the rogue boat as a light gray 20-footer with an aluminum hull, a small cabin and a 3-foot American flag flying from the stern. "US COAST GUARD'' was written in 12- to16-inch letters on the side, and a bar of lights was set on top of the cabin. The boat had no Coast Guard number painted on its side and no Coast Guard flag. Vessels used by the Huntington office use a rotating blue light rather than a light bar. Kern declined to give an exact description of the boat's lone male occupant. She said he fit the description of a "Joe Average American.'' Officials at the Coast Guard's Atlantic Area command office in Portsmouth, Va., said a small number of sightings of phony Coast Guard vessels have been reported since Sept. 11. All reports other than those from the Kanawha and Ohio rivers proved to be unsubstantiated. "We don't know if the boat meant to scope this area and then move on to the next, or if it was doing something else illegal,'' Kern said. "Maybe it was someone not taking their medicine who thought they would be doing the government a favor.''