Powder found in NJ post office
10:55AM: Market takes a sharp dive into negative territory on the heels of reports that suspicious powder was found at a post office in New Jersey... Traders have used the news as an excuse to sell into the week's gains as the indices move to their worst levels of the day... As a result of this move, the Nasdaq is now poised to finish the week lower, while the Dow and S&P 500 are set for incremental gains... Investors have rotated out of technology issues in favor of areas that have trailed the stock market's rally in 2003...
http://finance.yahoo.com/moI was just about to post the same thing - here's a link from another source
http://www.wnbc.com/news/2845436/detail.html Powder Sparks Probe At Jersey City Post Office
POSTED: 10:41 AM EST February 13, 2004
UPDATED: 10:57 AM EST February 13, 2004
JERSEY CITY, N.J. -- Authorities were investigating a report of a suspicious powder at a post office branch Friday morning.
A hazardous materials team was sent along with fire department crews to the Bergen Street post office after a woman reported coming in contact with an unidentified powdery substance, police Sgt. Edgar Martinez said.
"We're taking precautions and going in and checking it out," he said.
It was not immediately clear whether the woman was a postal worker or a customer, or whether the building was being evacuated.
The incident is the second this week involving a post office in New Jersey. A post office in Gloucester County was evacuated Tuesday morning after several workers there said they found a white powdery substance in their mail.
Postal officials said later they were looking into whether a mailing containing a powdery energy supplement burst open or at the possibility that there was no powdery substance -- dangerous or otherwise -- in the Williamstown post office.
Postal authorities are on high alert for dangerous substances in the mail after a powdery substance determined to be the poison ricin was found last week in a Senate office building in Washington, D.C. Officials have said they don't know if the ricin was mailed to the office.
A mail processing facility in Hamilton was shut down in October 2001 after letters containing anthrax passed through the building. Officials announced this week that the anthrax had been cleaned from the facility.
© 2004 by The Associated Press