Anthrax-detecting devices coming to mail facilities

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But the equipment, which will cost the postal system nearly $400 million nationally, won't detect ricin or other biohazards and the equipment will only check flat envelopes.

A package containing a vial of ricin was discovered in October 2003 at the mail-sorting center on Pelham Road that serves the Greenville-Spartanburg Airport.

The package contained a letter threatening to dump large quantities of the poison if new federal trucking rules weren't rolled back. Ricin can be more deadly than nerve gas.

Weeks later a similar letter, also signed "Fallen Angel" and containing ricin, was sent to the White House but intercepted by the Secret Service.

Ricin particles also were discovered last year on the mail-opening machine of U.S. Sen. Bill Frist. No one has been arrested in any of the incidents, despite a $120,000 reward offered by the FBI.

Officials said Monday that checking for ricin is a "possibility" in the future but the machines are now set to detect anthrax, which killed two postal employees in October 2001.

A postal spokesman said last year that there still were some problems in detecting ricin. Postal employees present for Monday's briefing in Columbia said they were pleased that something is being done.

George White, a mail handler for 21 years who is president of the Columbia postal workers union, said the system would give workers an "added sense of security."

"I think it's going to be a positive addition," he said.

The equipment will be installed in Greenville's mail processing site on West Washington Street in August, the last of four sites in the state to receive the machinery. Columbia will get the equipment first, followed by Charleston and Florence facilities in July.

The West Washington facility was picked because it primarily processes envelopes, officials said. The airport facility sorts packages, they said.

All mail processing facilities handle only outgoing mail. Whether an incoming letter to Greenville residents is checked for anthrax depends on whether it was sent from one of the 114 facilities with the equipment, officials said.

However, they said all mail processing sites in the nation will be equipped with the system by the end of 2005.

The Biohazard Detection System looks for anthrax by sampling air from around envelopes being processed in the facilities. The samples are injected into sterile water, and the mixture in analyzed by a machine that compares any DNA present to the DNA for anthrax.

Any positive result triggers an alarm, evacuations and automatic notifications to postal officials. The sample would then be taken to an approved lab to confirm the presence of anthrax.

Tad Kelly, a regional spokesman for the postal system, said packages aren't run through the equipment because the postal system already has procedures to spot suspicious packages.

And he said the fine powdery form of anthrax, what is called "weaponized" anthrax, wouldn't be as effective for terrorists in a package because only flat envelopes are run through feeding machines at postal facilities which squeeze the envelope.

The squeezing is what sends the puff of powder outside the envelope into the air, he said.

Johnny Barnett, maintenance manager for the Columbia mail processing facility, said anyone sending anthrax in the mail isn't going to send it in a form that will increase the chances of it being spotted.

"If you are thinking like a bad guy, you aren't going to do something that will attract attention to yourself," he said. "If we get odd-shaped envelopes, we have people trained to look at them. And if there is anything there, we pull those aside."

Kelly said regular procedures look for packages with excess postage, stains or leaking substances, or something suspicious in the return address.

No positives have yet been reported in more than 500,000 tests since the equipment was first deployed in 2004, officials said. They said no false positives have been reported either.

Any positive results confirmed by a lab would be announced to the public "right away," officials said.

The public and some emergency officials didn't learn of the Greenville ricin discovery for almost a week after its discovery.

In the event a positive test result is confirmed, employees will receive medications, mail trucks that received mail within two hours of the alarm will be quarantined and the mail inside the facility will be kept until it is determined safe for delivery, officials said.

"I really think this is a good system," said Shirley Johnson, who will monitor the equipment at all four South Carolina sites. "I think it will work."