BIG HOLES IN TERMINAL SECURIITY

Nobody wants to talk about the security mistakes they make, but data from the US Coast Guard points to the areas where terminal facilities may need to tighten up.

The worst security lapses at terminal facilities seem to be the most basic. Take gaps in fences, for example. That's top of the list of security violations identified by LT Christy Rutherford, Chief of Waterfront Facilities and Security for the US Coast Guard Marine Safety Office, Houston-Galveston.

"Some facilities' fences are not intact and are not low enough to the ground, basically providing enough clearance for people to climb under the fence or climb through a fence opening," says LT Rutherford, who consulted multiple US ports to draw up a dossier of frequent violations of the Maritime Transportation Security Act (MTSA). LT Rutherford presented her findings at the ILTA conference in Houston in June, and more recently talked to Tank Storage magazine about the common holes in terminal security. The United States MTSA of 2002 is similar in scope to the International Ship and Port Facility Security Code (ISPS Code), which was incorporated into European law last July. Both require terminals to adopt a Facility Security Plan, covering everything from organisation to training, and from drills to documentation. The main difference is that the MTSA has sanctions associated with it.

The top MTSA violations identified by LT Rutherford are not a carbon copy for security lapses everywhere, but the mistakes made at US ports give some insight into the security issues that terminal operators should look into.