Bomb Threat at JBER - VP Pence arrives today

Link to article.

Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson JBER is near where I live, so this is not good. Probably a prank, but who knows?

ANCHORAGE (KTUU) - JBER officials are currently responding to a bomb threat Monday, according to a base spokesperson, though it's not immediately clear how it is affecting military members, base residents or the public.

The threat was called in some time over the weekend, according to public affairs specialist Keisha Lafayette.

VP Pence is stopping here today.

Pence is scheduled to arrive in Alaska on Monday, according to his office. Further word on his itinerary haven’t been released, but he is scheduled to inspect missile-defense installations in the Last Frontier.

I can't help but wonder if the two are related somehow. Some partisan nut, who knows?

a reply to: Blaine91555

Yeah, probably just a coincidence.




Not.

a reply to: Blaine91555

My guess would be a partisan nut. Or just nut! We have enough of those here.

So he is off to South Korea. Is that for The Olympics? Probably a dig at KJU too. Also saw that Otto Wambler's dad is headed over too.

You might want to explain that JBER is a traditional stopping point for dignitaries on their way to Asia. And that it is fenced off for miles! I seriously doubt anybody would really try anything. My bar stool buddy would be the one to diffuse one! We had dollar bets on the Super Bowl and he won the "first to double digits" thanks to a missed field goal! Grrrr....

a reply to: TEOTWAWKIAIFF

It looks like they are being tight lipped with the local news. I'd imagine it was a fake scare or we would be hearing more about it. Probably best it's not getting coverage to rile up copy cats.

Yes for the Olympics. With him inspecting "missile defense" I'm sure his movements are under wraps.

a reply to: Blaine91555

It was probably Finance. Nonners don't like having to stay on base extra time.

a reply to: Zaphod58

I had to look up that word and I'll leave to others to look for themselves.

Could be

a reply to: Blaine91555

Thanks for the info!

It is kind of strange to look at the new thread list and see "JBER" listed! I've have not paid attention to local news lately.

a reply to: TEOTWAWKIAIFF

My wife mentioned it or I'd not have noticed. She keeps me up to date on local stuff or I'd miss a lot of it.

Hopefully we will get the rest of the story eventually. Sometimes I think a missile from NK could hit here and it would not get attention in the MSM.

A fly farts in NYC and its earth shattering news, but it's better that they ignore us in the end I think.

ISIS in Alaska

It could happen here, but I'd suspect Valdez would be target.

a reply to: Blaine91555

People don't realize how vital Alaska really is, and ignore it. I remember going through the airport at Anchorage, and seeing all the cargo birds sitting there. They had a stat in the airport talking about the billions of pounds of air freight that passes through there every year.

a reply to: Zaphod58

Yeah you can go out to Earthquake Park and watch the parade heading west. Busiest small plane airport in the US is also here.

Valdez I expect would be the most at risk. That terminal at the end of the oil pipeline is probably on all our enemies radar. We went out towards that on one weekend trip to take some photo's of birds and I was a bit surprised at how easy it looks to get to that. Imagine what would happen if that were breached and it poured straight into the ocean. With that many miles of pipe it would be a real mess. Take forever to stop it.

Update

ANCHORAGE (KTUU) - JBER officials finished responding to a bomb threat at 3 p.m. Monday, according to base spokespersons. Moreover, they confirmed that no explosives were located.

Senior Master Sgt. Jill LaVoie, public affairs superintendent with JBER, said the national guard building was evacuated to be searched. The search lasted for several hours, because the building is "very large."

End of story I suppose.

a reply to: Blaine91555

Yeah, there isn't a lot they can do as far as the air freight goes. But the pipeline through the area is wide open, and would be a disaster of epic proportions. I'd hate to think of what would happen with a serious attack on it.

a reply to: Blaine91555

See? I rest my case. It was the National Guard building.

a reply to: Blaine91555

The threat was supposedly specific to the JBER National Guard Armory building. Since it was called in "over the weekend," I wouldn't be surprised if it turned out that it was a guardsman who either didn't want to report in yesterday and miss the Superbowl, or a guardsman who tied one on a bit too tightly during the Super Bowl and was looking to get a day off.

If it was tied to Pence, there are certainly better places to make a threat about than the armory building that sits well far away from any facility Pence would be likely stopping in.

a reply to: burdman30ott6

I'm sure your right. At first that article before they updated it was very vague. At first it was just bomb threat, stay tuned and no answers from anyone.

a reply to: Zaphod58

All those miles of pipeline it would be hard to stop the flow quickly. I'd hope they have ways to stop it quick if the terminal were taken down.

I remember after 9/11 it was mentioned in the news as a primary terrorist target. When I was last in that area, the Navy had a ship sitting there.

a reply to: Blaine91555

I remember being up there fishing. There were some huge ships up there. And it was constant activity.

originally posted by: Blaine91555
With that many miles of pipe it would be a real mess. Take forever to stop it.

That depends. If the computer grid isn't affected, the TAPS Ops system here in Los Anchorage can shut that sucker down like Fort Knox in only a few minutes. They've got a decent density of gate valves from Gennallen south. If the computer link was knocked out, it would require manual closure of valves, but even then I think they could shut it down in time. Now, if it was the late 80s again and the line was carrying 2 million barrels a day, things would be pretty bad even with the redundant safety measures in place, but with the current 500,000 per day, I think they'd get that shut down pretty quick. Exxon Valdez was 260,000 barrels, and I doubt such an attack currently would equal more than 1/10th to 1/8th of that.

a reply to: burdman30ott6

Redundancy to I hope. The last job I worked in industrial construction was the loading terminal facility at the end of a pipeline carrying sulfur in molten slurry from a Sour Gas Plant in Wyoming. In just one of the "let down stations" where they dealt with all the back pressure, they had three redundant valve setups. They told us so much as small hole anywhere and the whole thing would have to be replaced. The wiring had triple redundancy also and at a Trona mine I did above ground work at they had five levels of redundancy on all controls, so I'd hope the pipeline here met those kind of standards.

At that Trona mine, GE made such a mess of the single line diagrams if we had not fixed things at our end, people would have died. GE came out one day and threw a fit and then had to apologize for their mess after review. I spent a month sitting on a bucket moving tiny wires around to fix things. I sure hope whoever did the engineering here did better than those clowns from GE back then.

originally posted by: TEOTWAWKIAIFF
a reply to: Blaine91555

My guess would be a partisan nut. Or just nut! We have enough of those here.

We've already seen what these people will do when whipped into a frenzy. Scalise anyone?