Missing Tanker Trailer Has N.J. Counter-Terrorism on Alert
By Jim Dolan
(Fort Lee-WABC, April 20, 2004) — New Jersey's Office of Counter-Terrorism is issuing an alert. It is searching for a missing gasoline tanker truck that vanished more than a week ago from a parking lot in Pennsauken.
Federal and state law enforcement agencies are concerned it could be used in a terrorist attack.
Jim Dolan is in Fort Lee with more.
There isn't a single possibility about this missing truck that isn't a little bit scary. It's been missing for more than a week now, and nobody seems to know exactly when it was stolen. Or, more importantly, why it was stolen.
But it is exactly the kind of vehicle that could be loaded with explosives, or chemical or biological weapons, and turned into a nightmare of a weapon. Yet it was stolen from an unguarded parking lot, and no one even noticed it was missing for at least three days.
It's a little hard to believe that something this big and this potentially dangerous could be stolen from a well-lit yard with nobody noticing, but that is what happened.
Capt. Drew Lieb, N.J. State Police: "Sometime between the 8th and 9th of April there was a -- tanker trailer stolen from a company in Pennsauken, that was taken out an unsecured yard. And we haven't
seen it since."
But nobody even noticed it was missing for three days, and now they're scrambling to recover. Law enforcement has sent out a bulletin to the private sector telling people and businesses to keep an eye out for the tanker, which may have been stolen for reasons having nothing to do with terrorism. It's just a chance they can't afford to take.
Capt. Drew Lieb: "Up until 9/11, we really didn't have many concerns about tankers, and being stolen. It was not an uncommon practice for tankers to be stolen, and just the criminal element to take them to be used somewhere else, or to be chopped up for the metal that's involved in it. Now, in (view) of what's happened, we're concerned that this could be used as a transport vessel for explosives, or a biological device."
Police are looking for:
A newly refurbished 1996 Freuhauf tanker.
It had "T-K Transport" written on the side when it was stolen, (though that may have been removed by whoever stole it).
It had a chrome tank.
It had the New Jersey license plate T85 2SC.
For the first time now law enforcement and legislators are all asking the question if enough scrutiny is being used on these tankers.
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