New York City, Washington and Northern New Jersey affected
The United States raised the terrorism threat level to code orange on Sunday, or ‘High’, for the financial services sector of New York City, Northern New Jersey and Washington, Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge announced. Ridge cited “new and unusually specific information about where al-Qaeda would like to attack.”
The rest of the nation remains at threat level yellow, or elevated. New York has remained at orange since the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.
Potential Targets include the following:
New York City
Newark, New Jersey
Washington, D.C.
Ridge said the plans appeared to include car and truck bombs -- “the attempted physical destruction of these facilities.”
Buffer zones around the buildings are likely to be expanded to ensure unauthorized vehicles are not able to approach them, and actions to strengthen security have already begun, he said. The companies’ executives and the buildings’ owners and operators have been briefed on the threat, he said.
“We have told them that at this time there is no information that indicates a specific time for these attacks beyond the period leading up to our national elections,” he told reporters in a hastily called news conference.
Officials said that in the last 24 to 36 hours, intelligence operatives have received very specific information showing that al-Qaeda has done very detailed surveillance on targets.
Ridge said, the level of detail in the intelligence was specific. “The quality of this intelligence, based on multiple reporting streams in multiple locations, is rarely seen and is alarming in both the amount and specificity of the information,” he said.
A senior intelligence official said that it was the most extraordinary detail he had seen in 24 years of intelligence work:
- The flow of pedestrians outside one building (14 people per minute midweek on each side of the sidewalks, or 28 per minute).
- Information that some explosive materials may not be hot enough to melt the steel underpinnings of a building, and a reference to what materials might heat to 2,700 degrees.
- Suggestions for building reconnaissance, such as a window table at a nearby coffee shop.
- Details about specific security checkpoints inside buildings, including a tidbit that people turned left after passing one checkpoint.
- Places to make contact with building employees.
- Construction of some buildings that might prevent their collapse.
Washington Mayor Tony Williams and several other key officials have been briefed about the threat, according to Tony Bullock, the mayor’s director of communications. “We are activating additional surveillance in specific parts of the city -- keeping a close eye on anything out of the ordinary,” Bullock said.
A New York City official said Saturday there were weekend meetings of police and Joint Terrorism Task Force members, including federal agency representatives. The official said city agencies are on high alert.
On Friday, the FBI issued a threat advisory to law enforcement officials in New York. The New York Police Department said commercial and financial institutions and some international organizations were possible targets.
Full Report - al-Qaeda Plotting to Attack U.S. Financial Institutions, DHS Warns
Transcript of Secretary Ridge’s Press Briefing
Source: CNN; Fox News