June 23, 2002: Lax Security Alleged at USAMRIID; Scientists There Inexperienced with Dry Anthrax

Arthur Friedlander. [Source: Defense Department / Larry Otsby]The New York Times reports that the FBI is investigating the possibility that the anthrax used in the 2001 anthrax attacks was smuggled out of USAMRIID, the US Army’s top bioweapons laboratory at Fort Detrick, Maryland. Arthur Friedlander, a senior USAMRIID scientist, says that researchers at USAMRIID use wet anthrax only and have no idea how to make dry powders (the anthrax used in the attacks was a dry powder). But FBI agents are questioning USAMRIID scientists about the possibility that someone could smuggle out some of the anthrax and refine it elsewhere. Luann Battersby, a microbiologist who worked at USAMRIID from 1990 to 1998, says FBI agents interviewed her for three hours on June 12 about the smuggling theory. She says: “I said it was extremely easy to do.… A quarter-million micro-organisms fit in the period at the end of a sentence. It doesn’t take any great strategy to take this stuff out.” [New York Times, 6/23/2002]