FEMA: Site and Layout Design Guidance Publication
FEMA directs the securing of access points such as manholes to protect water treatment plants and storage tanks from contaminants. FEMA directs locking
manhole covers as a physical security measure. |
FEMA: Risk Assessment: A Guide to Mitigate Potential Terrorist Attacks
FEMA directs as a layer of defense the locking of manhole covers, as mitigating against the threats of bombs, chemical and biological attacks. |
Manhole Security and U.S. Critical Infrastructure
Manholes are small, inconspicuous, and unattended; they offer easy access to vital underground infrastructure, so we had better think of ways to make them more secure, and do so quickly.
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Wall Street Security Gets New Line of Defense
Days of Easy Access to the Underground Ending
by Mary Calvi
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(CBS) NEW YORK Monday was just another day on Wall Street. Another billion and a half shares traded. Every investor order delivered electronically, all through an extensive technical circuit below ground.
In most parts of the city, gaining access to electric, cable or fiber optics takes about a minute through manholes.
"It's just too easy for terrorists, vandals to gain access to the underground," said Mike Manoussos of Manhole Barrier Security Systems.
But now on Wall Street, to get below you first have to get through a new form of barbed wire. Below 183 manhole covers in the financial district are steel security devices.
And unless you have the coded key ... "You would need some kind of special saw and about an hour drilling to try to get through it," Manoussos said. "This is really the beginning of an infrastructure of security."
The beginning of a plan to create a ring of steel around the financial district, like in London where there are points of entry and exit and battalions of closed-circuit TV cameras.
"Bin Laden himself has said he wants to attack our economic system," CBS 2 security expert Bob Strang said. "What better way than to attack the New York Stock Exchange and to attack where we transfer billions of dollars a day."
(© MMVI, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.)
U.S. Department of Homeland Security requires
manhole security
FEMA, U.S. Department of Homeland Security, in its Reference Manual, December 2003, states: “Manhole covers 10 inches or more in diameter must be secured to prevent unauthorized opening”.
U.S. Department of Homeland Security and the FBI warn
of the dangers of unsecured infrastructure
A joint U.S. Department of Homeland Security and FBI Information Bulletin, July 30, 2004, states the potential threat to homeland using heavy transport vehicles borne with explosive devices targeted at military areas, infrastructure and centers of economic power, and sets forth protective measures to ensure physical security which includes the locking of manhole covers.
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