- BRAIDWOOD, Illinois -- She
was the second driver to breeze past the guard station at Braidwood's nuclear
facility in the span of a week.
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- But it's unclear if the trespass arrest of Wilmington's
Christina Staley, Tuesday, will result in changes to the nuclear generating
station's security apparatus.
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- Neal Miller, station director, noted that Ms. Staley,
31, had apparently become disoriented and was looking for some place to
turn around when she drove past the security post at 9 a.m.
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- She was stopped within seconds by facility security and
Braidwood police.
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- A week earlier, Chicagoan Khalid Ghadron, 29, sped past
the checkpoint in the dead of night, then sped around the employee parking
lot before leaving the area.
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- Ghadron was later collared by a Wilmington officer after
police spotted him forcing another motorist off the roadway and driving
across the river bridge without headlights. Braidwood police added the
charge of criminal trespass.
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- Federal prosecutors reviewed the incident but declined
to bring charges against Ghadron, who told police he was an alien of the
extraterrestrial sort.
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- Ms. Staley was released from custody after posting a
$100.
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- Miller today lauded the performance of both plant security
and police, both of whom responded quickly to stop a motorist who had no
apparent intent to damage the facility.
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- But in the wake of Sept. 11 and the Oklahoma City incident
in which a U-Haul truck packed with explosive devastated the city's federal
building, should Braidwood's security plan include a barricaded facility
entrance?
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- Braidwood Police Chief Rob Andreina thinks so.
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- "It would be better to have an actual physical barrier
in place," said the chief, who, along with his officers, was among
the first on the scene Tuesday after plant security triggered an intrusion
alert.
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- "I suggested it to them that day, in fact. If they
put a physical barrier up they won't make it in.
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- "Having the sentries out there is great, but without
a physical barrier it's like having a guard dog without teeth," said
Andreina.
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- Miller today said he is unsure of the distance between
the employee parking lot and the reactor building, but noted the company
has response scenarios in place to cope with various degrees of threat
to the facility.
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- "If they tried to enter a different part of the
plant, a different level of the security plan would be implemented,"
noted Miller.
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- Citing security reasons, Miller would not speculate on
the distance from the deepest penetrations of the recent intrusions to
the plant's more sensitive areas.
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- Miller said that the security plan now in place was developed
in cooperation with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and worked as it
was designed to during the recent incidents.
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- "There is a security plan that looks at all sorts
of things like this and there are different barriers in place..."
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- But Miller declined to comment on whether that planning
took into account an Oklahoma City-like truck bombing attack.
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- He did say that the facility's security response is under
continuous evaluation.
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- http://www.daily-journal.com/content/?id=18583
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