Federal Agents Seize Manure on ‘Dirty Bomb’ Worries
Federal agents have begun seizing radioactive horse manure at veterinary clinics around the country that specialize in treating bone disorders in horses. The agents apparently are acting on fears that terrorists might use the horse droppings to construct so-called dirty bombs.
“I think what they’re worried about is that someone could collect a truck load of radioactive manure, pack it around a conventional explosive and then detonate it in a densely populated area,” said Mike Espenshade, a terrorism expert who specializes in animal-based terrorism. “Imagine if someone splattered radioactive horse poop all over a shopping mall.”
It was Espenshade who first alerted the Department of Homeland Security to the possibility terrorists might use bomb-sniffing dogs to commit acts of terrorism, even as they searched for terrorist bombs. His warnings led to the Federally funded program in which specially trained dogs monitor their bomb-sniffing fellow canines while they are at work searching for bombs.
The manure search by Federal agents is focussed on veterinary clinics that specialize in equine medicine and perform scans of horse bones using radioactive isotopes. Manure excreted by a horse after one of the examinations is radioactive for a time.
The agents appear unannounced and demand to see a clinic’s horse manure, which is usually piled somewhere in the rear of the building. Most clinic operators are bemused by the request and readily grant permission for the agents, who wear rubber boots, protective suits and face masks, to poke through the manure pile.
In several cases, agents have called in mechanical loaders and dump trucks and hauled away horse manure that was deemed too radioactive.
“Hey, this is great,” said the operator of a New Jersey clinic, who asked not to be identified. “They can have a permanent contract to take it all away. I won’t even bill them for it.”
At a clinic outside Milwaukee, a clinic operator who was involved in a long-running dispute with the local township over removal of his large pile of horse manure, refused permission when Federal agents showed up with scintillation counters and asked to examine his manure. Agents returned the next day with a subpoena for “any and all horse excrement” located on the premises and spent the next three days carting it away with dump trucks.
In some parts of the country, horse manure is a key component in the production of mushrooms. Scattered reports indicate that Federal agents have also used scintillation counters to search for radioactivity at some mushroom growing facilities.
“We don’t believe any radioactivity has been found,” a spokeswoman for the National Mushroom Growers Association said. “But we have begun to discuss implementing our own monitoring program as part of our patriotic duty.”
She emphasized that shoppers at supermarkets have no reason to fear they might be purchasing radioactive mushrooms.