Photo By Senior Chief Petty Officer Ryan Wilber | Brandon M. Grant, Federal Bureau of Investigation special agent, Jackson, Miss....... read more read more
BILOXI, Miss. - Special agents from the Federal Bureau of Investigation traveled from Jackson, Miss., to facilitate their first local level Improvised Explosives Familiarization and Chemical Outreach Class at Woolmarket Small Arms Range, Biloxi, Miss., June 21. Military members from the Navy, Army and Air Force, along with police officers and members of the chemical industry were in attendance.
The one-day training included in-class instruction followed by an explosives demonstration, and was a collaboration between the FBI, Jackson, Miss. Division, the Biloxi Police Department and 20th Seabee Readiness Group designed to forge relationships with first responders, military, law enforcement and chemical industry partners, and provide awareness of the dangers of improvised explosives and their precursors.
“We’re trying to hit local State and Federal law enforcement that deal with responding, and showing them how improvised explosives can be created off commercial products that have a dual use nature that can be bought at retail stores. The other aspect of it [the training] is to bring our chemical industry partners in, and show them some of the products they may use in their processes that can be made into explosives,” said Special Agent Brandon M. Grant, FBI, Jackson, Miss. Division. “What we realized is that chemicals are everyone’s problem, and a lot of these chemicals we are concerned about we need in our daily lives, to purify our water, take care of our cuts and scrapes, and things along those lines.”
During the in-class instruction students were taught about household items and chemicals that can be used to make improvised explosives, which are of real concern to military and civilian law enforcement.
Knowing about how you can make homemade bombs out of every day materials is something we [law enforcement] need to know about, and something we need to remain vigilant on, so we can perform our duties and keep the base safe, said Master-at-Arms 2nd Class Keontez George, assigned to Naval Construction Battalion Center Security Department.
Jeffrey Sanchez, a branch manager for Allied Universal Corporation, a bleach manufacturer for water treatment facilities said that knowledge about improvised explosives extends to the civilian sector also. He said his company takes these dangers seriously, and stresses the importance of public accountability.
In today’s society you need to be aware of what’s out there. Bringing products in on the railcars, it gives us a better knowledge of what we’re looking for to basically protect the people out there,” said Sanchez.
With the assistance of Biloxi Police Department bomb squad personnel, Chuck Boling, an FBI special agent bomb technician for the Jackson, Miss. Division facilitated an explosives demonstration.
“The demonstration is to reinforce what they [students] see during the training, to actually show them that these improvised explosives will injure them or kill them, and for them to also see what commercially made explosives look like, and then comparing the two so they can see a side-by-side demonstration of shots going off, so they will understand if they see this stuff it’s not safe to pick up or touch. They need to call a bomb squad to come out and respond,” said Boling.
The training was designed with a goal of forging relationships between the FBI, law enforcement, and chemical producers and distributors. When these entities are knowledgeable and share information it is less likely that criminals will be successful.
We want to get the law enforcement and the responder community talking more to their industry community, and we [the FBI] are just sort of a conduit… We are not regulators, we don’t impose fines, it’s more of a collaborative relationship, and that is what we are looking for, a collaborative relationship between Local, State and Federal law enforcement, the local chemical industry and the retailer locations.
Boling said that he hopes the students take two things away from the training: awareness and reporting.
I want them [students] to be aware that there are groups, there are criminals out there that are willing to put themselves in danger, willing to make this stuff, and we want them to be aware it’s out there and when they see something they notify law enforcement. And, when law enforcement responds… they don’t injure themselves and they notify us, another federal agency or state agency, so somebody can put these guys in jail.
Assistance regarding weapons of mass destruction, such as improvised explosives is available 24-hours a day, 7-days a week through calling your local FBI WMD coordinator at (601) 948-5000.
| Date Taken: | 06.21.2012 |
| Date Posted: | 07.02.2012 10:50 |
| Story ID: | 90994 |
| Location: | BILOXI, MISSISSIPPI, US |
| Web Views: | 302 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
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