Mass Destruction
Weapons of Mass Destruction
There are several schools of thought in regards to what defines a Weapon of Mass Destruction (WMD). According to Christopher (2014), WMDs are destructive devices that may be explosive, incendiary, or poisonous. Any weapon involving a disease or any weapon designed to release radiation or radioactivity at a level dangerous to human life is also considered a WMD. (p. 59). This, as you could imagine is a major security challenge for port maritime operations due to the amount of material that is distributed in and around ports. As stated above there are well over 500 million containers shipped world-wide in a calendar year. The likelihood that a WMD could be smuggled into the United States secretly via cargo containers …show more content…
Anhydrous ammonia and many other TICs are considered to be persistent, meaning has the ability to continue in its natural state regardless of the environment that it’s in. To make matters worse, Tampa Bay is a very large metropolitan area that is one of the largest tourist areas in Florida. If these terminals were to be attacked than the entire area would need to be evacuated immediately and unfortunately this all would happen so quickly that the response time would be very limited. There are several examples in history where TICs and TIMs have killed thousands and rendered entire cities and communities destroyed, such as “The Great Halifax Explosion of 1917” or the April 1947 ship explosion in Texas City, Texas.
The Great Halifax Explosion of 1917 was a massive explosion that killed more than 1,800 people, injured another 9,000, including blinding 200, and destroyed almost the entire north end of Halifax, including more than 1,600 homes (Staff H. , 2010). This massive explosion was the result of two very large cargo ships colliding in the Halifax harbor, one cargo ship was carrying unstable picric acid, TNT, munitions and high octane gasoline. The Texas City ship explosion has been categorized as one of the worst disasters in United States history. According to the CNN.com staff
There are several schools of thought in regards to what defines a Weapon of Mass Destruction (WMD). According to Christopher (2014), WMDs are destructive devices that may be explosive, incendiary, or poisonous. Any weapon involving a disease or any weapon designed to release radiation or radioactivity at a level dangerous to human life is also considered a WMD. (p. 59). This, as you could imagine is a major security challenge for port maritime operations due to the amount of material that is distributed in and around ports. As stated above there are well over 500 million containers shipped world-wide in a calendar year. The likelihood that a WMD could be smuggled into the United States secretly via cargo containers …show more content…
Anhydrous ammonia and many other TICs are considered to be persistent, meaning has the ability to continue in its natural state regardless of the environment that it’s in. To make matters worse, Tampa Bay is a very large metropolitan area that is one of the largest tourist areas in Florida. If these terminals were to be attacked than the entire area would need to be evacuated immediately and unfortunately this all would happen so quickly that the response time would be very limited. There are several examples in history where TICs and TIMs have killed thousands and rendered entire cities and communities destroyed, such as “The Great Halifax Explosion of 1917” or the April 1947 ship explosion in Texas City, Texas.
The Great Halifax Explosion of 1917 was a massive explosion that killed more than 1,800 people, injured another 9,000, including blinding 200, and destroyed almost the entire north end of Halifax, including more than 1,600 homes (Staff H. , 2010). This massive explosion was the result of two very large cargo ships colliding in the Halifax harbor, one cargo ship was carrying unstable picric acid, TNT, munitions and high octane gasoline. The Texas City ship explosion has been categorized as one of the worst disasters in United States history. According to the CNN.com staff