Terrorism response tested at Pier 53
By Walter Wright
Advertiser Staff Writer
National Guard Sgt. Kai Peleholani, sweating buckets inside a blue plastic protective suit, bent over the 55-gallon steel drum with the red wires snaking to a battery inside Matson Container No. 662264-5 isolated at Pier 53.
Bruce Asato • The Honolulu Advertiser
It was about 80 degrees in the shade, but inside Peleholani's suit the temperature was nearing 110.
Sgt. 1st Class Tony DeMello gets scrubbed down as part of a mock weapons-of-mass-destruction investigation at Honolulu Harbor. The exercise was staged by the Hawai'i Army National Guard's 93rd Weapons of Mass Destruction Civil Support Team.
Less than a mile across the harbor, the glass faces of downtown Honolulu skyscrapers stared blankly toward the pier where Peleholani and 21 other members of the Hawai'i Army National Guard's Weapons of Mass Destruction team were working feverishly.
Their job was to figure out what was in the barrel, in two 20-ounce water bottles nearby labeled Part One and Part Two, and in two newspaper-wrapped bundles that set off a roar from a Geiger counter.
Was it a "dirty bomb" that could spray nuclear radiation from stuff in the suspicious bundles? Or maybe the stuff in the barrel was a biological agent, or a poison.
Fortunately for Peleholani and the populace of Honolulu, the barrel contained water, and the bundles held innocuous test samples of cesium and uranium. The whole thing was a test.
And the bottles? Oh, just two chemicals which, if combined, would create cyanide gas.
Nasty stuff, said Army Maj. Brad Higgins, the Army's observer for the exercise and the person who planted much of the suspect material. But the team had been warned that it wouldn't be a good idea to mix the two.
Bruce Asato • The Honolulu Advertiser
The terrorism response exercise staged by the Guard's 93rd WMD Civil Support Team yesterday morning was primarily for the team to practice working with its partners in the Federal Fire Department, Honolulu Fire Department, Honolulu Police Department, state Department of Health radiation team, the Army's 196th Infantry Brigade and the Coast Guard.
Army Guardsmen, from left, Sgt. Ka'i Peleholani, Sgt. 1st Class Tony DeMello and Capt. Jeff Korando consult before donning their protective suits.
It almost immediately revealed a confusion over areas of responsibility. When Assistant Federal Fire Chief Jack Lee said he was the incident commander, a Coast Guard official in the group stepped forward to announce that "if this was the real deal, my boss would be the incident commander."
That exchange, 93rd commander Lt. Col. Stanley E. Toy said, was a useful example of the need for advance communication and coordination that must be maintained between the partners.
The exercise was also a test, of sorts, for Matson, which passed with flying colors, Higgins said.
Matson stashed the "terrorist" container among thousands in the yard, and made sure that liquid would leak outside.
When Matson drivers not in on the test spotted the leak, they promptly reported it to the shipping company, setting off the rest of the scenario.
But the exercise was also an indication of the terrorism challenge faced at the nation's ports.
The suspect container was spotted because it was leaking.
Few, if any, of the thousands of other containers stacked up in the yard revealed such outward clues as to what might be inside.
Reach Walter Wright at wwright@honoluluadvertiser.com or 525-8054.
