posted on Jul, 12 2002 @ 08:58 PM
....The Nuclear Emergency Search Team (NEST) was created, enlisting volunteers from the Atomic Energy Commission's nuclear weapons complex to train
to respond to nuclear terrorist threats. NEST conducts regular small-scale exercises annually, participating in full-scale interagency tests less
frequently. The last such test, run by the FBI and code-named MIRAGE GOLD, involved between 800 and 1,000 personnel and took place in New Orleans,
Louisiana, from October 16-21, 1994 (the previous full scale exercise was in 1986). The premise of MIRAGE GOLD concerned a fictitious domestic
terrorist group�the Patriots for National Unity�which assembled and threatened to detonate nuclear weapons within the United States. Postexercise
evaluation reports were highly critical of the FBI's management of the drill, noting that the agency had neglected to involve any state or local
officials, and operated "in an imperial fashion" by failing to communicate with the other involved federal agencies (DOD, DOE, FEMA).....