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Brève du Monde ou article du Statesman.
Poudre découverte dans une résidence universitaire: pas de la ricine
AFP 27.02.06 | 06h17
Le FBI a conclu que la poudre découverte dans une résidence universitaire d'Austin, au Texas (sud) n'était pas de la ricine, un poison mortel, a indiqué l'université dans un communiqué.
"Bien que le FBI n'ait pas pu statuer définitivement sur la nature de la substance, l'agence fédérale a indiqué qu'elle était certaine que ce n'était pas de la ricine ou un autre agent toxique", a précisé la même source.
Après la découverte jeudi de cette poudre dans la résidence universitaire de Moore-Hill, à Austin, des analyses préliminaires dans un laboratoire d'Etat avaient indiqué que le produit suspect était de la ricine.
Les 400 étudiants de la résidence ont été évacués et la police fédérale a lancé une enquête. Deux étudiants exposés au produit avaient été placés en observation dans un lieu tenu secret.
Mais le FBI a pu déterminer par des analyses plus poussées que le produit suspect n'était pas de la ricine, une toxine pouvant être utilisée comme arme biochimique par des terroristes.
La graine de ricine (Ricinus communis), plante très commune, contient une huile toxique à base d'acide ricinoléique qui agit sur les cellules et provoque des lésions hépatiques et rénales.
Mortel et facile à produire, l'extrait de graine de ricine peut être dissout dans de l'eau, injecté ou vaporisé.
Le poison a souvent été utilisé dans le monde de l'espionnage pour se débarrasser discrètement d'un ennemi.
UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS
Powder found at UT might not be poison
Federal labs doing more tests for ricin after doubts about initial positive result.
By Laura Heinauer
AMERICAN-STATESMAN STAFF
Sunday, February 26, 2006
A mysterious whitish-brown powder found in a roll of quarters in a dormitory room on the University of Texas campus might not be the poison ricin after all.
A preliminary test by the Texas Department of State Health Services laboratory in Austin returned a positive result for the potentially fatal substance, prompting an evacuation of the Moore-Hill residence hall, an investigation by the FBI and worries of a link to terrorism.
But three subsequent tests at the same lab came up negative.
In addition, none of the people who might have been exposed - including the student with the quarters, her mother, her roommate and their residence hall assistant - has symptoms of ricin poisoning. The symptoms, which typically include breathing difficulty, cough, fever, nausea and tightess in the chest, usually develop within hours of exposure, health officials said.
"I'm pretty confident it's not ricin," Mike Elliott, senior district commander for Austin-Travis County Emergency Medical Services, said Saturday. "The state lab tends to be more presumptive in telling you what it might be."
It could take a day or two before additional tests at federal laboratories, which have more sophisticated equipment, give conclusive results, Elliott said.
The drama began Thursday when a student opened a roll of quarters in her dorm room to do laundry and discovered the powdery substance.
The roll came from a bank and was given to the student by her mother, who lives in the Houston suburb of Pearland, at some point last semester.
Elliott described the powder as heavy and course.
Someone intending to cause harm with a poison would probably have used a finer consistency that would be easier to inhale, he said. It's also possible that the powder was originally fine but became chunkier because of high humidity, he said.
Some banks use a powdery substance to clean coins, but such an explanation is "purely conjecture at this time," Elliott said.
"There are a lot of things that it can be and a lot of things that it likely isn't," Elliott said, adding that the powder might not contain ricin but something with a similar molecular structure.
He said less than a gram was collected, about half the contents of a packet of sugar.
The FBI called in specialists in weapons of mass destruction from Quantico, Va., to collect samples for tests at federal labs, said FBI agent Rene Salinas, a spokesman with the agency's office in San Antonio.
That office is leading an investigation of the incident by the Joint Terrorism Task Force. Also on Saturday, local hazardous materials crews took apart washing machines at the dorm to see if they could find any additional powder.
"The final tests should give us a definitive answer" on whether the substance is ricin, Salinas said. "We don't believe there to be a terrorist connection at this time."
UT officials said that the powder spilled onto the student's hands when she opened the roll of quarters but that she promptly washed her hands.
Investigators would not identify the bank where the student's mother obtained the quarters. It was unclear whether the coins were rolled by a machine or by a person.
Officials gave this chronology of events:
•The powder was reported to campus police about 3 p.m. Thursday, and samples were taken to the state lab. The dorm room and the laundry room were cleaned and sanitized that afternoon.
•Campus officials learned of the positive test result for ricin about 7 or 8 p.m. Friday. Students were evacuated from Moore-Hill about 11:30 p.m. Friday after discussions with public health and law enforcement officials.
•A second cleaning and sanitizing of the affected areas took place, and students were allowed to return about 12:30 a.m. Saturday, though access to some areas, including the laundry room, was still restricted Saturday night.
Officials said the university followed a white powder protocol developed after the anthrax scares in 2001. Ricin was found in the office of U.S. Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn., in 2004 and was found in correspondence mailed to the White House and the federal Department of Transportation in 2003.
University officials would not release the name of the student who found the powder, but The Associated Press reported that it was UT freshman Kelly Heinbaugh. Phone calls to Heinbaugh's home in Pearland were not returned Saturday.
Officials sought to assure the 400 students who live in Moore-Hill, less than a block from the football stadium, that they were safe. Despite all the emergency vehicles and uniformed officials outside the dorm Saturday, the students seemed unfazed.
Initial rumors about chemical weapons being found inside the building later turned into jokes, and although a few students stayed in other dorms Friday night, most did not.
"Someone said that we should declare February 25 Powdered Sugar Donut Day," said John Seale, a 20-year-old senior majoring in business.
"When I heard 'chemical weapon,' I was thinking, 'Oh, my God. I'm going to die in my sleep,' " said Kayla Croft, an 18-year-old freshman majoring in nursing. "Seeing the guys in the blue suits and oxygen tanks was scary, but then we realized we were safe, and everything pretty much settled down."
UT officials said students and staff members with questions may call a hot line established by Travis County Health and Human Services. The phone number is 974-2327.
lheinauer@statesman.com; 445-3694
What is ricin?
Pronunciation: RYE-sin
What it is: A poison that can be made from waste left over from processing castor beans to produce castor oil. It can be in powder, mist or pellet form, or it can be dissolved in water or a weak acid.
Beneficial uses: Potential medical applications include use in bone marrow transplants and treating cancer by killing infected cells.
Harmful uses: In 1978, Bulgarian writer Georgi Markov, a communist defector living in London, died after he was attacked by a man with an umbrella that had been rigged to inject a ricin pellet under his skin. Ricin might have been used in the Iran-Iraq war during the 1980s.
Symptoms: Usually occur within several hours and depend on the dose and manner of exposure. Can include difficulty breathing, vomiting, diarrhea, low blood pressure and organ failure.
How it works: Prevents cells from making the proteins they need, causing the cells to die.
Antidote: None known.
Source: U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
Poudre découverte dans une résidence universitaire: pas de la ricine
AFP 27.02.06 | 06h17
Le FBI a conclu que la poudre découverte dans une résidence universitaire d'Austin, au Texas (sud) n'était pas de la ricine, un poison mortel, a indiqué l'université dans un communiqué.
"Bien que le FBI n'ait pas pu statuer définitivement sur la nature de la substance, l'agence fédérale a indiqué qu'elle était certaine que ce n'était pas de la ricine ou un autre agent toxique", a précisé la même source.
Après la découverte jeudi de cette poudre dans la résidence universitaire de Moore-Hill, à Austin, des analyses préliminaires dans un laboratoire d'Etat avaient indiqué que le produit suspect était de la ricine.
Les 400 étudiants de la résidence ont été évacués et la police fédérale a lancé une enquête. Deux étudiants exposés au produit avaient été placés en observation dans un lieu tenu secret.
Mais le FBI a pu déterminer par des analyses plus poussées que le produit suspect n'était pas de la ricine, une toxine pouvant être utilisée comme arme biochimique par des terroristes.
La graine de ricine (Ricinus communis), plante très commune, contient une huile toxique à base d'acide ricinoléique qui agit sur les cellules et provoque des lésions hépatiques et rénales.
Mortel et facile à produire, l'extrait de graine de ricine peut être dissout dans de l'eau, injecté ou vaporisé.
Le poison a souvent été utilisé dans le monde de l'espionnage pour se débarrasser discrètement d'un ennemi.
UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS
Powder found at UT might not be poison
Federal labs doing more tests for ricin after doubts about initial positive result.
By Laura Heinauer
AMERICAN-STATESMAN STAFF
Sunday, February 26, 2006
A mysterious whitish-brown powder found in a roll of quarters in a dormitory room on the University of Texas campus might not be the poison ricin after all.
A preliminary test by the Texas Department of State Health Services laboratory in Austin returned a positive result for the potentially fatal substance, prompting an evacuation of the Moore-Hill residence hall, an investigation by the FBI and worries of a link to terrorism.
But three subsequent tests at the same lab came up negative.
In addition, none of the people who might have been exposed - including the student with the quarters, her mother, her roommate and their residence hall assistant - has symptoms of ricin poisoning. The symptoms, which typically include breathing difficulty, cough, fever, nausea and tightess in the chest, usually develop within hours of exposure, health officials said.
"I'm pretty confident it's not ricin," Mike Elliott, senior district commander for Austin-Travis County Emergency Medical Services, said Saturday. "The state lab tends to be more presumptive in telling you what it might be."
It could take a day or two before additional tests at federal laboratories, which have more sophisticated equipment, give conclusive results, Elliott said.
The drama began Thursday when a student opened a roll of quarters in her dorm room to do laundry and discovered the powdery substance.
The roll came from a bank and was given to the student by her mother, who lives in the Houston suburb of Pearland, at some point last semester.
Elliott described the powder as heavy and course.
Someone intending to cause harm with a poison would probably have used a finer consistency that would be easier to inhale, he said. It's also possible that the powder was originally fine but became chunkier because of high humidity, he said.
Some banks use a powdery substance to clean coins, but such an explanation is "purely conjecture at this time," Elliott said.
"There are a lot of things that it can be and a lot of things that it likely isn't," Elliott said, adding that the powder might not contain ricin but something with a similar molecular structure.
He said less than a gram was collected, about half the contents of a packet of sugar.
The FBI called in specialists in weapons of mass destruction from Quantico, Va., to collect samples for tests at federal labs, said FBI agent Rene Salinas, a spokesman with the agency's office in San Antonio.
That office is leading an investigation of the incident by the Joint Terrorism Task Force. Also on Saturday, local hazardous materials crews took apart washing machines at the dorm to see if they could find any additional powder.
"The final tests should give us a definitive answer" on whether the substance is ricin, Salinas said. "We don't believe there to be a terrorist connection at this time."
UT officials said that the powder spilled onto the student's hands when she opened the roll of quarters but that she promptly washed her hands.
Investigators would not identify the bank where the student's mother obtained the quarters. It was unclear whether the coins were rolled by a machine or by a person.
Officials gave this chronology of events:
•The powder was reported to campus police about 3 p.m. Thursday, and samples were taken to the state lab. The dorm room and the laundry room were cleaned and sanitized that afternoon.
•Campus officials learned of the positive test result for ricin about 7 or 8 p.m. Friday. Students were evacuated from Moore-Hill about 11:30 p.m. Friday after discussions with public health and law enforcement officials.
•A second cleaning and sanitizing of the affected areas took place, and students were allowed to return about 12:30 a.m. Saturday, though access to some areas, including the laundry room, was still restricted Saturday night.
Officials said the university followed a white powder protocol developed after the anthrax scares in 2001. Ricin was found in the office of U.S. Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn., in 2004 and was found in correspondence mailed to the White House and the federal Department of Transportation in 2003.
University officials would not release the name of the student who found the powder, but The Associated Press reported that it was UT freshman Kelly Heinbaugh. Phone calls to Heinbaugh's home in Pearland were not returned Saturday.
Officials sought to assure the 400 students who live in Moore-Hill, less than a block from the football stadium, that they were safe. Despite all the emergency vehicles and uniformed officials outside the dorm Saturday, the students seemed unfazed.
Initial rumors about chemical weapons being found inside the building later turned into jokes, and although a few students stayed in other dorms Friday night, most did not.
"Someone said that we should declare February 25 Powdered Sugar Donut Day," said John Seale, a 20-year-old senior majoring in business.
"When I heard 'chemical weapon,' I was thinking, 'Oh, my God. I'm going to die in my sleep,' " said Kayla Croft, an 18-year-old freshman majoring in nursing. "Seeing the guys in the blue suits and oxygen tanks was scary, but then we realized we were safe, and everything pretty much settled down."
UT officials said students and staff members with questions may call a hot line established by Travis County Health and Human Services. The phone number is 974-2327.
lheinauer@statesman.com; 445-3694
What is ricin?
Pronunciation: RYE-sin
What it is: A poison that can be made from waste left over from processing castor beans to produce castor oil. It can be in powder, mist or pellet form, or it can be dissolved in water or a weak acid.
Beneficial uses: Potential medical applications include use in bone marrow transplants and treating cancer by killing infected cells.
Harmful uses: In 1978, Bulgarian writer Georgi Markov, a communist defector living in London, died after he was attacked by a man with an umbrella that had been rigged to inject a ricin pellet under his skin. Ricin might have been used in the Iran-Iraq war during the 1980s.
Symptoms: Usually occur within several hours and depend on the dose and manner of exposure. Can include difficulty breathing, vomiting, diarrhea, low blood pressure and organ failure.
How it works: Prevents cells from making the proteins they need, causing the cells to die.
Antidote: None known.
Source: U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention