If they were suspicious enough to write an article about, why weren't they suspicious enough for the ferry's crew to radio ahead and have the police waiting at the end of the line to question these people?
This really sounds like a freelance newsie reaching for a non-story.
This was on KIRO TV news last night -- I put a post up on it earlier in the thread, saying the television report went into a lot more detail. The online news story is lame, lacking details while full of pre-9/11 reassurances.