COLUMBIA, S.C. - At first glance, the state's newest tool to fight terrorism looks like a simple 18-wheeler.

But the plasma-screen televisions and other high-tech equipment inside the vehicle will give South Carolina law officers an edge when negotiating with hostage-takers or planning strategy during a terrorist attack, State Law Enforcement Division Chief Robert Stewart said.

Sheriffs from around the state got their first glimpse of SLED's mobile command center Thursday during a meeting of the South Carolina Sheriffs' Association.

The portable command center would be available to law enforcement and other responders during emergencies - everything from hurricane evacuation to chemical spills to hostage situations. The center got its first assignment earlier this week as part of security when President Bush spoke to legislators at the Statehouse, Stewart said.

The 40-foot-long vehicle is equipped with a conference room where officials can coordinate strategy, five plasma screens that beam images from surveillance cameras, telephone lines for communication with suspects and emergency officials and satellite television.

It's the type of high-tech counterterrorism vehicles more states are getting since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, Stewart said. SLED's $450,000 unit was paid for with money from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, he said.

"Not all sheriffs' offices can afford anything like that," said Georgetown County Sheriff Lane Cribb, who is president of the association.

The vehicle, designed with the help of SLED agents, is just weeks old and has already been used as a model for law enforcement in Denver, Colo., Stewart said.

The vehicle can be used for more than counterterrorism, Stewart said, including situations like the recent chlorine spill in Graniteville that killed at least nine people. It also could be used to monitor suspects when they take hostages, enabling law enforcement to make quick decisions.

"Timely information makes all the difference in the world," Stewart said. "In SWAT situations, you may have five or six seconds to make a decision and that decision affects whether people live or die."

Soon, SLED helicopters will be equipped with a system that will allow agents to shoot images from the air and beam them back to the command center, which could be as many as seven miles away. The command center would be able to send those images via the Internet to emergency officials elsewhere in the state or nation.

Having the mobile command center would have made Abbeville County Sheriff Charles Goodwin feel safer when his deputies responded to a hostage situation more than a year ago that left two law enforcement officers dead. Holed up in their home, the suspects were using high-powered weapons that could have easily harmed many of Goodwin's deputies.

"With the weapons they were using, we were in harm's way," Goodwin said. "We were placing ourselves in jeopardy."

The mobile command unit could have been parked more than a mile away and long-distance surveillance cameras still would have allowed law enforcement officers to monitor what was going on at the home.

Authorities have said the December 2003 attack was planned by a family upset over state plans to take some of their land to widen the highway. Deputy Danny Wilson and Donnie Ouzts, an employee with the Abbeville magistrate's office, were killed. Steven Bixby, his father, Arthur Bixby, and his mother, Rita Bixby, are awaiting trial.

"This could be invaluable in those kinds of situations," Stewart said. "You'd know in real time what decisions to make because you're seeing it.

"You're not hearing about it. You're seeing it."