ALERT! FBI looking for truck that passed through Colorado!

9 News Denver ^ | 2-14-03 | Chris Vanderveen

[RandallFlagg]

DENVER - Concern among members of the FBI’s Joint Terrorist Task Force has surfaced in Colorado. A semi-truck driving through the state on Thursday afternoon apparently triggered a nationwide alert going out to law enforcement agencies across the state Friday night.

Only a few specifics of the alert were released. Apparently, it stems from what happened at a Sinclair gas station in Byers around 1:30 p.m. Thursday. Byers is about 40 miles east of Denver on I-70.

Two men described as Middle Eastern in an 18-wheeler with a white tractor truck apparently tried to put unleaded gasoline into the truck. An attendant advised them it would not work and told them they needed to use diesel.

The men fueled up with the correct gas, paid in cash and left on Highway 36, which would connect them to I-80 in northeastern Colorado.

The truck has a Quebec, Canada, license plate number RS7-116. The name on the truck is Real Transport.

Authorities ran a check on the license plate and said it was clear, but it does not have a current registration.

The FBI sent out the alert shortly before 5 p.m. Friday. It advises law enforcement officers that if the semi is contacted to identify the occupants and determine if there is a current registration available.

If the FBI has any other reason to be worried about the semi, it's not saying.

There’s no confirmation that this is tied into any possible terrorism, but with the country on high alert, no one wants to take any chances.

[Miss Marple]

If you have cable or satellite, Blair is on live responding to the UN.

[geopyg]

In that case, I'm glad THIS truck is from Canada - and not the one from California with the Boric Acid. The Canadian truck is probably just filled up with plain-old gasoline (10,000 gallons +/-).

[Free Trapper]

In my previous post I was only thinking of saltpeter being used in explosives because that's what you were thinking.Right?

Years ago,IIRC both saltpeter and boric acid were used as food preservatives but the boric acid wouldn't work like saltpeter for explosives.

Saltpeter is still used in some processed foods,I believe.Don't eat "too" much lunchmeat,if you know what I'm getting at.:0)

[RandallFlagg]

Yep! That's what I was thinking...

[Movemout]

"Noted where? There is nothing on this thread or any other thread (covering the subject of boric acid) that would indicate even one single practical use for it by terrorists. I could make a more dangerous weapon out of dry-ice and 2 liter plastic coke bottles, than I could with boric acid. "

Here is one possible use for your consideration:

Boranes and Borohydrides

• Sodium borohydride, NaBH4 , is produced by reacting NaH and BCl3. It is a very good and useful reducing agent.

• NaBH4 reacts with BF3 to form diborane, B2H6.

• - a colorless gas that bursts into flame on contact with air

[RandallFlagg]

Well, folks. I really need to get at least a couple hours of sleep before our FReep tomorrow. G'Nite!

[Free Trapper]

You can get it at the drugstore and use it to dust areas where the bugs walk through it,they carry it back home and more get into it.

Pretty cheap way to kill roaches but I don't know if it would do the same for liberals.

[leadpenny]

Thanks. I don't what-the-heck channel I had it on. AMC, I think. All three Cable Networks are covering.

[NautiNurse]

Isn't Denver about 2000 miles from Quebec?

[ATOMIC_PUNK]

an OTR tractor should do about a thousand miles on a tankfull

More than that a semi has 2 feul tanks at about 100 to 130 gallons a peice if not more and with 2 drivers they can cover twice the mileage faster without stopping.

[Movemout]

Here is another:

amorphous boron is used in pyrotechnic flares (distinctive green colour), and rockets (as an igniter)

[leadpenny]

Seems as if the truck has been in the USA for at least a year.

Good point. "Sleepers?"

[JoJo Gunn]

"....I don't know if it would do the same for liberals."

Liberals are zombies, same as dead anyway. My pipe dream was a wish wasted, heehee. But thanks for that info, I'd never heard it.

[Free Trapper]

You got me,no map handy.

Even if these guys fueled before they would probably have pulled up at pumps where other trucks were fueling.

At some small stops there might only be a couple of truck pumps and nobody fueling to give these witless wonders any idea where to fuel.

Also,if they added gasoline to a fair amount of diesel in the tanks,the truck would still run,at least for a while.

[Miss Marple]

I am going to bump this for the morning folks.

[Milwaukee_Guy]

"A semi-truck driving through the state on Thursday afternoon apparently triggered a nationwide alert going out to law enforcement agencies across the state Friday night."

Over a 24 hour delay getting the word out?

If I was at the gas station, I would have let the morons fuel up with nolead and called the Highway Patrol and told them to look for a white semi with a blown engine.

If nothing else, the plume of boric acid would have helped direct authorities to the location! :-O

[Free Trapper]

I can't remember off the top of my head what chemicals are used but something can be used in molotov cocktails that will cause them to ignite upon the bottle breaking and exposure to air without resorting to a lit wick.

Chemistry was a long time back for me.;0)

[MrNeutron1962]

You forgot, I had it, you got it.

BTW, if it has enough Boron 10 in it Boric Acid makes a great neutron absorber.

[Boot Hill]

There is something you may have missed in that quote you posted. Let me re-post it with emphasis.

"There is nothing on this thread or any other thread (covering the subject of boric acid) that would indicate even one single practical use for it by terrorists."

First off, your chemical formula and example uses sodium borohydride, but that is NOT boric acid. The stolen truck carried boric acid.

Second, even if you managed to dredge up a truck load of sodium borohydride, just where the hell do you expect to come up with a tanker full of the highly toxic gas, boron triflouride, that your formula calls for?

Third, the only terrorist value to the resulting diborane gas is that it is highly combustible. You know like common, ordinary, everyday natural gas and propane that can be gotten anywhere, anytime and with very little cost or trouble. Moreover, your diborane spontaneously combusts with air, which is a highly undesirable characteristic when making a bomb or pyro compound, because it can not be easily controlled and tends to blow up in your face.

Fourth, there are literally hundreds of easier to use compounds, found in ordinary life and business, that are far more useful to terrorists (than what you propose), so that a terrorist does not need to go running around the country side stealing trucks full of sodium borohydride and tankers full of boron triflouride (should they ever find any).

Boric acid is of no practical use to terrorists.

--Boot Hill

[Movemout]

Me too (Chemistry was a long time back for me). Boric acid is a fairly benign substance. However, it is primarily used to create boron compounds. There is no evidence that this truck is full of boric acid. I was just responding to Boot Hill's comments that nobody had commented on any use for boric acid that might be dangerous.