Anyone who knows me realizes I have a fondness for 80’s actions movies. The dumber the better; all action, little on the plot. If you ever watched the 1987 action film called Wanted: Dead or Alive starring Rutger Hauer you’ll remember what I’m talking about. Hauer’s Nick Randall is a bounty hunter tasked with tracking down Arab terrorist Malak Al Rahim who is in our country.
Gene Simmons, of the rock band Kiss, is the bad guy. The end of the movie finds Randall tracking down Al Rahim as he drives an 18 wheeler through the streets of Los Angeles. Let’s say it doesn’t go well for him. All good action movies should end with a boom. Though this movie was filmed nearly 30 ago, and seemed fantasy, in a day and age when ISIS is making threats to attack metropolitan cities in America the plot no longer seems like a joke.
In the United States the trucking is just one component of a huge transportation industry which includes airlines, ships, railways and roadways. Increased globalization has created a demand by populations a great need for cheaper prices, broader and faster production and central repositories. Because of these burdens the locations of facilities have moved further away from population centers. The distance that product needs to move has created a logistical issue and along with it the need to secure the transportation and personnel from crime, theft and hijacking.
Trucking, like other methods of transportation has in it a logistical problem of storing, transporting, warehousing and handling product while maintaining security. Common crimes are the hijacking of cargo loads that are left unattended at fuel islands and loads disappearing from carrier facilities. Imagine then ISIS stealing a vehicle and kitting it up with armor and explosives.
A horrible scenario would be the use of trucks by terrorists as weapons for large scale destruction in the form of a vehicle borne improvised explosive device. (VBIED) Imagine a common looking trailer driving into any largely populated area such as a mall or parade. Cleary it looks normal but the vehicle is actually a VBIED created by the sick minds of ISIS members. These vehicles can accessed from remote terminals, hidden in a down-town warehouse and would be used to blow up a city block at a time of their criminal choosing.
How do we stop them? Resources are needed to prevent a breach in security because the criminally minded can exploit the gaps in protection. Thieves who are astute enough in the world of trucking crime can manipulate and present fraudulent paper-work at the loading docks of facilities and drive off with cargo to make a chemical weapon.
Many employees are given access to half-a-million dollars of cargo before their background checks are completed. Terrorists who team up with cartels who already have access to trucks could be a serious problem.
Just recently the UK Daily Mail posted images of an armor-plated ‘suicide truck’ carrying 10 tons of explosives captured by Kurdish fighters. More than 20 bomb barrels are seen in the back of the suicide truck. Several of these ISIS suicide trucks, packed with bombs, have been uncovered by Kurdish militia during their offensive in Syria’s north-east. This particular vehicle was discovered before it could wreck carnage.
Explosions caused by these VBIEDs can be seen from miles away. Any kind of destruction by ISIS in America would be horrible.
The trucking industry largely has functioning plans in effect in order to prevent the theft of cargo yet security must be laser focused when it overseas hazardous materials that can disappear through hijackings. Industry should be spending more to prevent something like this from happening.
In the end, security stands its best chance of being effective if the personnel running the programs have global strategies, capable threat assessment programs, screening programs, worker identification credentials and work with law enforcement to ensure their security programs are successful. Information sharing allows facts to be shared and programs to be improved.
Technology is currently being applied in the form of GPS devices, biometric door locks, or kill-switches. These are successful methods but are costly in an industry where many container loads are inconsequential as a loss.
But the effects of a terrorist attack from the loss of an inexpensive truck load could be far reaching to the public. I pray that never happens.