South Florida ports to get scanners to check containers for radioactive materials

[seafan]

S. Florida ports to get scanners to check containers for radioactive materials

By Bill Hirschman
South Florida Sun-Sentinel
Posted November 14 2006

Every cargo container being trucked out of ports in Fort Lauderdale, Palm Beach County and Miami will be screened for radioactive material beginning this spring, U.S. Customs and Border Protection confirmed Monday.

The anti-terrorism effort is part of a national campaign to secure the country's largest ports with radiation detectors by 2008, said customs spokesman Zachary Mann in Miami.

snip

An average of 1,500 containers per day leave Port Everglades in Fort Lauderdale, carrying everything from produce to spare parts. The Port of Palm Beach in Riviera Beach counts about 500 trucks daily and Miami's traffic ranges between 1,500 and 2,000 trucks a day.

snip

The portals are tentatively planned to be operational at the exits of Port Everglades and the Port of Miami in May and at Palm Beach in July, Mann said.

Federal funds will pay for the project to screen all containers at the nation's 22 largest ports. Mann did not have cost figures available or the name of the firms supplying the portals. The GAO report indicated each portal costs about $55,000, but it was not known Monday how many would be placed at each port.

snip

[RagingInMiami]

1. Well as long as they're not searching for drugs

[Fire Walk With Me]

2. Good! There was a bill for more port security for LA Harbor

on the ballot but I dont' know if it passed.

[texpatriot2004]

3. Part of port security nm