- WASHINGTON -- America celebrated
New Year amid unprecedented security, with fighter patrols, helicopter
gunships and no-fly zones over New York, Las Vegas, Washington and Chicago.
-
- New York's police chief, Ray Kelly, promised that Times
Square - where up to a million people traditionally gather at midnight
- would boast "better security than any place in the world".
-
- The mayor, Michael Bloomberg, said he would join the
crowds in Times Square, after dismissing comments by a Republican congressman,
Christopher Shays, that he would avoid the square as too much of a "tempting
target" for terrorists.
-
- Police were expected to be reinforced by prison guards,
FBI agents and National Guard troops at potential terrorist targets from
the neon-lit Las Vegas "strip" to the Hoover Dam. Mobile anti-aircraft
missile batteries were placed around Washington.
-
- Sharpshooters were to man high buildings in key cities
and Blackhawk helicopters would patrol the no-fly zones, some of them 40
miles across. Suspect aircraft would be intercepted by the helicopters.
It they continued to close in, they would risk being shot down by fighter
aircraft.
-
- Military helicopter gunships patrolling the Las Vegas
skies were armed with weapons able to "dismantle or destroy any kind
of ground attack".
-
- In Pasadena, California, sensors were to monitor the
New Year's Day "Rose Bowl" American football game in case of
biological attack.
-
- © Copyright of Telegraph Group Limited 2004.
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