The nation's most significant anthrax scare happened last year in southern Columbiana County.

The nation's most significant anthrax scare happened last year in southern Columbiana County.
By BOB JACKSON
VINDICATOR STAFF WRITER
Jim Cannell likes his life in Sebring. It's the kind of town where people know one another when they walk into the local diner, where kids grow up learning to play basketball and where families go to church on Sunday.
Nestled quietly in Mahoning County's southwestern corner, it's the kind of place that could be a poster town for Americana.
It's the last place he'd expect to be the target of a terrorist attack.
But even here, in this town of about 4,900 people where Cannell is the fire chief, he knows it could happen.
In fact, officials in the Mahoning and Shenango valleys are learning that a terrorist attack can happen anywhere, at any time, even in their town. The threat doesn't exist only for New York City or Washington, D.C., anymore.
"The federal government is shoving this message on us because they know something's up," said Cannell. "Do I take it seriously? Yes I do. But I hope to God it never happens."
Disaster and emergency services officials are being instructed to train their personnel to handle situations involving terrorism or weapons of mass destruction.
Nothing to joke about: Some people snicker at the thought of a terrorist taking aim at a small town instead of a major city, but it's no laughing matter, said Robert E. Rhoades, emergency response coordinator for the Ohio Department of Health.
"You mention terrorism and everybody thinks they're going to see [Osama] bin Laden running around with a bomb," Rhoades said. "It won't be bin Laden who gets you. It's the guy who's sitting at home in his basement doing weird stuff. He's the one you've got to worry about."
Bin Laden, a Saudi Arabian millionaire, is head of a terrorist group called Al Qaeda.
The point of a terrorist is always to disrupt public services and induce fear and panic, Rhoades said.
"It doesn't matter if it happens at the Jeep plant in Toledo, an abortion clinic in Cincinnati or at the high school in Sebring," he said.
He was speaking to a group of emergency officials who had gathered in Sebring for training on how to prepare for a terrorist attack.
According to the Federal Emergency Management Agency, terrorism is the unlawful use of force or violence against people or property for the purpose of coercion, intimidation or ransom.
Terrorists often use threats to create fear among the public, to try to convince citizens that their government is powerless to prevent terrorism and to get immediate publicity for their causes.
Political motivation: But random acts of violence don't necessarily add up to terrorism, said Al McGinty, coordinator of terrorism and weapons of mass destruction for the FBI regional office in Cleveland. It's only a terrorist attack if it is politically motivated.
The FBI has jurisdiction over domestic terrorism, including the use of weapons of mass destruction or any threat of their use. Weapons of mass destruction may be chemical, nuclear or biological.
While McGinty acknowledged that the government is pressing counties and municipalities to include scenarios of terrorism and weapons of mass destruction in their emergency response plans, he said it does not want to spread panic that an attack is imminent.
"We're not immune from this kind of thing just because we live in the middle part of the country, but you are more likely to be hit by lightning than to be hit with a terrorist incident," McGinty said.
A FEMA fact sheet says most terrorist situations in the United States have been bombing attacks, like the one on the World Trade Center in New York City in 1993, and most have been in the Western states.
Foreign terrorists look for targets where they can avoid detection before or after the attack, like airports, large cities, major international events or high-profile landmarks.
Chance for attack: The chance of a terrorist attack in the local area is extremely low because of the rural nature of the counties, said James R. Thompson, Mercer County Emergency Management Agency director.
"But if it happens, the consequences are staggering," he said, noting that "Oklahoma City brought it to the heartland." He was referring to the April 19, 1995, bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building by Timothy McVeigh that killed 168 people, including 19 children. McVeigh is scheduled to be executed May 16.
Walter Duzzny, Mahoning County EMA director, said a terrorist attack can happen any place there is a large group of people, like a Youngstown State University football game at Stambaugh Stadium or the Canfield Fair.
And a chemical or biological weapon, not a bomb, would most likely be the weapon of choice, McGinty said. Anthrax threats are becoming more and more common across the country.
Anthrax is a deadly livestock disease that can be transmitted to humans, causing flulike symptoms that are often unrecognized by hospital emergency room personnel. It is curable if it's caught and treated immediately, but can be fatal if left unchecked.
One of the problems in dealing with terrorists is that they don't usually pick up a telephone or write a letter to give warning of their plans. They usually strike without warning, hoping to catch authorities and the public off-guard.
The FBI opened 74 cases involving weapons of mass destruction in 1997, including 22 biological threats. By 1999, the numbers had risen to 225 weapons cases, including 167 biological threats, McGinty said.
Local anthrax scare: The total number of weapons cases dropped to 204 in 2000, but 90 of them involved anthrax. The biggest anthrax scare in U.S. history happened last year in Columbiana County.
"It happened in East Liverpool, not in New York City," McGinty said.
FBI agents intercepted a letter at the East Liverpool Post Office containing suspected anthrax. The moldy greenish substance found in the letter was tested at the Ohio Department of Health and was found to have contained spores, but no anthrax, Rhoades said.
A Wilkes-Barre, Pa., man has been charged with two counts of mailing threatening communications.
McGinty said there has never been a real anthrax strike in the United States.
"They have all been hoaxes," he said. "Some are more effective than others, but none of them have been real."
Lack of preparedness: Rhoades called the case a "very, very big deal" because of the concern it caused in the community and the light it shed on the fact that local officials were woefully unprepared to handle such a situation.
Since then, officials in the Mahoning and Shenango valleys have stepped up efforts to train personnel in how to handle biochemical cases. Training seminars are conducted regularly and plans are in place to deal with such attacks, including evacuation of civilians, Duzzny said.
"Anthrax is just one aspect of what a terrorist could do," Duzzny said. "There are a lot of chemicals on the market today that are easily accessible."
Every county is required to have a local emergency operations committee in place whose duties include keeping track of all hazardous materials made, shipped or stored within its boundaries, he said.
It's especially important for police departments to be trained in handling biochemical attacks because they will most often be the first to respond to an emergency situation, said Linda Beil, Trumbull County EMA director.
Small acts, too: Beil said terrorism isn't always a large-scale event like a bomb or a health-hazard attack.
"A small act of terrorism can just be someone trying to take out the 911 system," she said. "It could be anything, anywhere. There are some wacky people out there. You've got to be prepared for just about anything."
In Lawrence County, 911 dispatchers are constantly reminded to be alert for patterns in calls that could indicate a biochemical assault, said Director Frank Janetti.
"If we get a number of calls from people exhibiting the same symptoms, our people need to be able to realize the possibilities and contact the right people to get the ball rolling," Janetti said. "We never scoff at anything. To us, anything is a possibility."
Because biological materials can't necessarily be seen and sometimes take time to grow and cause a disease, it is almost impossible to know that a biological attack has occurred, the FEMA information says.