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| Al-Qaeda Targets Lethal Disease Research Facility on NY Island |
| 2008-09-25 |
| Until her arrest in Afghanistan this summer, Aafia Siddiqui was the FBI’s most wanted woman in the world. Now the U.S.-educated, Pakistani mother of three is being held in New York’s Metropolitan Detention Center facing attempted murder charges. Aafia Siddiqui holds biology and neuroscience degrees from Massachusetts Institute of Technology (M.I.T.) and Brandeis University. In 2003, she vanished from Pakistan and reappeared on July 17, 2008, outside the governor’s compound in Ghazni, Afghanistan. According to the FBI indictment against her, Siddiqui was carrying “various documents, various chemicals, and a computer thumb drive.” Aafia Siddiqui is believed to be an al-Qaeda operative. Among the documents in her possession were handwritten notes referring to a “mass-casualty attack” listing locations commonly known to be targets: Wall Street, the Brooklyn Bridge, the Statue of Liberty, and the Empire State Building. But one target, Plum Island, remains virtually unknown to the American public. If Siddiqui really is an al-Qaeda operative, the consideration that this government facility (officially known as the Plum Island Animal Disease Research Center) is a target is unnerving. Located approximately eight miles off the coast of Connecticut, the 840-acre research facility is home to the most virulent zoonotic diseases in the world. The lethal diseases stored and studied on Plum Island are transmitted to humans by animals. The only U.S. strains of foot-and-mouth disease (eradicated from American soil in 1929) are secured in freezers on Plum Island, as are strains of polio, hog cholera, and African Swine Fever. None of the animals on the island ever leave; those that come uninvited, like deer that sometimes swim there from the mainland, are shot. The island, located in the Long Island Sound, is 85 miles north of Manhattan. It was purchased as a government facility in the late 1800s and used as a defense fort during both world wars. After World War II, Plum Island became a bio-warfare lab — with its set-up and operation spearheaded by former Nazi scientist Eric Traub, who had been Hitler’s bio-weapons doctor before he was captured. In 1954, the Department of Agriculture took over control of Plum Island, transforming the facility into “America’s first line of defense against foreign animal disease.” By 1999, outspoken scientists and government officials called for the facility to be closed down, saying the study of obscure zoonotic diseases did not warrant the $16.5 million that taxpayers were spending on it each year. Further, many felt the risks associated with a category-five hurricane hitting the laboratory outweighed the benefits of the research going on there. A hurricane in 1991 knocked power out on the island and threatened the release of deadly germs; there was another power outage in 2002. Along came the terrorist attacks of 9/11. Control ceded to the Department of Homeland Security and the government shifted its focus from closing the facility to expanding it. In a recent op-ed piece for the Hartford Courant, Connecticut State Attorney General Richard Blumenthal outlined some of the dangers associated with the “monstrous risks” of the Plum Island facility — should it be compromised. Among them: * The proximity of Plum Island to New York City, one of the nation’s most populous cities and a repeated target of terrorist attacks. * The fact that 20 million people live within 50 miles of Long Island Sound. * The proximity of Plum Island to a nuclear submarine base, a nuclear submarine construction facility, the U.S. Coast Guard Academy, and a major nuclear power plant. * The special security risks of protecting and providing emergency response services to an island. A final decision about whether or not to expand the current island facility or move it will be reached before the administration change on January 20, 2009. Until then, the debate as to where the facility should go continues. One fact is not up for debate. Al-Qaeda’s desire for a mass-casualty attack on American soil isn’t going anywhere. That an al-Qaeda operative — a scientist with a biology degree from M.I.T. — was arrested overseas with a U.S. biological and agro-defense facility listed in her own handwriting as being on a “wish list” of attacks only underscores this fact. No wonder the FBI considered Aafia Siddiqui one of the most wanted women in the world. Note: Siddiqui failed to show up for her arraignment in federal court in Manhattan on September 4. Her attorney cited poor health as she recovers from a gunshot wound. During an interrogation in Afghanistan last July, Siddiqui commandeered a weapon and fired at U.S. Army officers, FBI agents, and her interpreters. One agent returned fire and Siddiqui was shot in the torso. In August, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security listed five mainland locations (other than Plum Island) it is considering to house a new, Biosafety Level 4 laboratory: Flora, Mississippi, is at the top of the list. Other sites include Athens, Georgia; Manhattan, Kansas; San Antonio, Texas; and Butner, North Carolina. |
| Posted by:Anonymoose |
| #9 Lab 257 is the title of the book I have. Very fine, factual account if seeming a little sensationalized. |
| Posted by: FOTSGreg 2008-09-25 23:07 |
| #8 I've got a pretty good book on Plum Island around here somewhere (probably in a box packed up for my move next week), but I was under the impression that the lab was shut down. |
| Posted by: FOTSGreg 2008-09-25 23:03 |
| #7 Plum Island - virtually unknown, except to those who read Nelson Demille's books see: "Plum Island" but copy the link and visit via Fred's link to Amazon, then he gets a share... |
| Posted by: Frank G 2008-09-25 20:37 |
| #6 "Why go all the way to New York when muslims can get all the polio they want in Pakistan?" That's a winner :) LINK |
| Posted by: Spong Speaking for Boskone5381 2008-09-25 20:24 |
| #5 al-Qaeda doesn't realize it, but this woman crossed over into "license to kill" territory. While she personally is getting a lifetime membership to Florence, Colorado, anyone she came into contact with has a death penalty on them. There is absolutely, positively no sense of humor about messing with bio. |
| Posted by: Anonymoose 2008-09-25 13:50 |
| #4 Why go all the way to New York when muslims can get all the polio they want in Pakistan? |
| Posted by: ed 2008-09-25 13:00 |
| #3 In the middle of the desert in Nevada or Utah would be good. |
| Posted by: DLR 2008-09-25 12:59 |
| #2 Why isn't Midway Island on the list of potential sites? Isn't a few hundred miles of salt water good insulation of risk? Or are these risks transmitted by airborne currents? |
| Posted by: Halliburton - Asymmetrical Reply Division 2008-09-25 11:26 |
| #1 I figure that UGA would be a target since it has a large animal lab there, but wouldn't the CDC in Atlanta be another target too be concerned about? |
| Posted by: sinse 2008-09-25 11:18 |