Coaching US troops on Iraqi culture

US officials say the military is transforming to meet the changing face of war in Iraq and Afghanistan. BBC Arabic's Roula Ayoubi reports on a new "cultural training" programme to improve US soldiers' skills in dealing with local people.

The US military has built two "Iraqi towns" in a California desert
"Assalamu alaykum, Ahlan wa sahlan, welcome." With these words, Iraqi sheikhs greet a group of marines in a narrow room at the beginning of a training session.
The class is part of "Mojave Viper", a new pre-deployment cultural training course established to prepare US forces for what the military calls "irregular warfare" in Iraq.
The meeting starts with a prayer suggested by the group's Iraqi interpreter, who wears a marine uniform.
"No matter where we are, in Wadi Sahara or in Khalidiya, we are working as one for the good of this city, and as long as we are one, we will get the best results, Insha'allah," says the "mayor" of Wadi Sahara, addressing the marines.
Despite what the blue-domed mosque nearby suggests, the training is not taking place in Iraq but rather in Wadi Sahara and Khalidiya, two fictional Iraqi towns built in the middle of the Mojave desert, in California, as part of a $23m project.
The Iraqi "sheikhs" are mostly Iraqis recruited as role players.
Marines' challenge
The Centre for Advanced Operational Culture Training is the new military body specialised in "improving marines' cultural skills and foreign language abilities".
Barack Salmoni, deputy director of the centre, says the focus reflects a 2006 military assessment that "developing broader linguistic capability and cultural understanding is critical to prevail in the long war and to meet 21st century challenges".
During the six- to eight-week course, the marines learn about 200 basic words in Arabic - enough to allow them to deal with local people on the ground in Iraq.
Choosing his words carefully, the marine commander in the training session tries to explain the difficulties US forces face in building trust.
We noticed that we had the military tactics but lacked the knowledge of Iraqi laws and traditions so we needed to learn about them all
Barack SalmoniCentre for Advanced Operational Culture Training
"While my marines are dedicated in working with the Iraqi army and police to eliminate the threat from insurgents, we know that the enemy insurgents hide among the people and that the people are not our enemy," he says.
And, of course, the problem goes both ways.
"The local population is becoming intimidated because they don't know who to trust," reserve army commander Lieutenant General Jack Stultz says.
In 2003, on the eve of the Iraq war, the administration of US President George W Bush excluded "nation building" in Iraq and Afghanistan from its plans.
But, Mr Salmoni says, the US military became aware of the need to give the troops' mission in Iraq "civil and cultural dimensions" when the Bush administration decided to establish a new Iraqi government.

The US military is trying to teach troops how to build trust with Iraqis
"We noticed that we had the military tactics but lacked the knowledge of Iraqi laws and traditions so we needed to learn about them all. I am afraid we didn't anticipate all these bifurcations."
Since January, newly established PRTs (Provincial Reconstruction Teams) have increased their operations in Iraqi cities.
The military is becoming more involved in "civil affairs", which entails helping to build local infrastructure.
And this, says Lt Gen Stultz, means "the Reserve Army, like the army, is in transformation".
He believes that the civil affairs teams "can do more to build the trust" with the population.
The reservists are the main force in the civil affairs teams in Iraq. And according to the Pentagon, only 260 soldiers out of some 200,000 in the Army Reserve speak Arabic.
Nonetheless, says Lt Gen Stultz, "if a person has a specific language skill that's a plus for us, but I'm not focused on recruiting Arabic speakers".
'Not only warriors'
Marines start their career in a Marine Corps base in Quantico, Virginia. There, I met Frank Mease, now a major in the marines.
He did the culture training before deploying to Iraq last year. He says that it "was preparing us to be able to execute our duties professionally and work with the Iraqis and with the local population.
"Our mission overall is to provide a secure situation to the Iraqi security forces to take over and to the Iraqi government to stabilise itself."

Marines must take the cultural training course before going to Iraq
Mr Salmoni acknowledges that the perspective on the military's role has changed.
There was a "misunderstanding when the Americans first arrived in Iraq," he says. The assumption was that their mission was "purely military".
But after the soldiers started this kind of training "the relationship with Iraqis got better," he says.
"There is a fundamental shift in what it means to be a marine. We are not only warriors any more, we are teachers, we are builders, we are doctors and engineers."
Cultural sensibilities
As the insurgency in Iraq has grown, raids on houses and mosques have become a daily event for the US military in Iraq.
These operations are performed mainly by the marines, who are required to undertake the cultural training programme if they are to be deployed to Iraq.

Soldiers are coached on dealing with questions on women and Islam
Joe Harris, the training centre's Arabic teacher, describes the main topics covered on the course as "religion, the importance of mosques to Muslims, the importance of family values, and how to treat men in front of their families and tribes, and how to conduct searches in houses and mosques".
Mr Harris, an American of Moroccan origin, is a former marine himself.
He considers Islam and the treatment of women to be particularly delicate subjects in Iraq - and has coached soldiers on how to deal with them sensitively.
When one marine major was asked in a cultural training session by one of the "tribesmen" if his battalion had any Muslims, he respectfully answered that eight of his soldiers were Muslim and that he was ready to introduce them to the tribesmen.
The second sensitive question he received was from another tribesman asking how many wives he had.
He cautiously answered: "I have only one... only one wife and we have five beautiful children together, but what I admire about Arab men is that they are able to marry four women and satisfy them all... I consider one wife a full-time job!"

Third of Iraqis 'need urgent aid'

Nearly a third of the population of Iraq is in need of immediate emergency aid, according to a new report from Oxfam and a coalition of Iraqi NGOs.
The report said the Iraqi government was failing to provide basic essentials such as water, sanitation, food, and shelter for up to eight million people.
It warned the continuing violence was masking a humanitarian crisis that had grown worse since the invasion in 2003.
It also found that four million Iraqis had been uprooted by the violence.
More than two million people have been displaced inside the country, while a further two million have fled to neighbouring countries, according to the report.
On Thursday, an international conference in Jordan pledged to help the refugees with their difficulties.
'Dire poverty'
The BBC's Nicholas Witchell in Baghdad says the report by the UK-based charity and the NGO Co-ordination Committee in Iraq (NCCI) makes alarming reading.
OXFAM/NCCI REPORT IN FULL
Rising to the humanitarian challenge in Iraq (324KB)
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The survey recognises that armed conflict is the greatest problem facing Iraqis, but finds a population "increasingly threatened by disease and malnutrition".
It suggests that 70% of Iraq's 26.5m population are without adequate water supplies, compared to 50% percent prior to the invasion. Only 20% have access to effective sanitation.
Nearly 30% of children are malnourished, a sharp increase on the situation four years ago. Some 15% of Iraqis regularly cannot afford to eat.
The report also said 92% of Iraq's children suffered from learning problems.

Millions of Iraqis have been forced to flee the violence, either to another part of Iraq or abroad - many of those are living in dire poverty
Jeremy HobbsDirector of Oxfam International
Alarming humanitarian crisis
"Basic services, ruined by years of war and sanctions, cannot meet the needs of the Iraqi people," the director of Oxfam International, Jeremy Hobbs, said.
"Millions of Iraqis have been forced to flee the violence, either to another part of Iraq or abroad. Many of those are living in dire poverty."
Mr Hobbs said that despite the violence, the Iraqi government and the international community could do more to meet people's needs.
"The Iraqi government must commit to helping Iraq's poorest citizens, including the internally displaced, by extending food parcel distribution and cash payments to the vulnerable," he said.
"Western donors must work through Iraqi and international aid organisations and develop more flexible systems to ensure these organisations operate effectively and efficiently."
Oxfam has not operated in Iraq since 2003 for security

Reporter Thembi Mutch spent seven weeks in Thailand and Cambodia, finding out what life is like for children trafficked into the region's thriving sex industry.

Many trafficked children have horrific stories to tellI arrived in Thailand on Friday morning, and by the evening my researcher and I were already scouring the bars of Bangkok, attempting to work out our game plan.
We were in the region to find children who had been trafficked into sex work - those who are hidden away, often by armed pimps and traffickers in suburban bars and houses.
Prostitution is illegal in Thailand, although women and men are allowed to do bar work over the age of 18.
But in both Thailand and Cambodia, sex work is so lucrative for everyone involved that it is more blatant than almost anywhere else in the world.
It is not just tolerated, but unofficially, according to many non-governmental organisations (NGOs), it is actively encouraged by both the police and the government.
Posing as tourists
A recent memorandum of understanding between the countries in the Mekong region - including Thailand and Cambodia - has done much to stem child prostitution.
So too has more 10 years of aid work and advocacy by NGOs such as Save the Children and World Vision.
But despite this, resorts like the Thai beach town of Pattaya seem to be more like industrialised brothels than functioning towns.
The sex industry has also expanded to Cambodia, with many children employed as domestic workers, bricklayers, in fish processing plants, while at the same time dipping in and out of the best paid option, sex work.
Most of these children are not there voluntarily - they are trafficked.
Trafficking is helped along by the economic boom in South East Asia. The frantic rate of construction springing up in the region has brought more staff with a desire for young sex workers.
It is not an easy task to pose as "interested tourists" in these areas. We hung out on the streets at night, and got information of where children were working from local sex workers.
We recorded in blacked-out vehicles, changed hotels regularly, and I could never let the recording equipment be seen, or check my recordings, until I was safely inside the hotel.
Once, in Cambodia, we recorded traffickers making deals of children over coffee in a cafe in broad daylight.
The atmosphere was hostile, and the men were clearly on hard drugs, and drinking.
"Who are these people," I muttered to Ang, the ex-prostitute who was my fixer.
"They're Vietnamese and Cambodian government officials," she replied, and my heart sank.
We left immediately, aware that it costs $50 (£25) to hire a hit man in Cambodia.
We were followed almost continuously that day, and also on several others. Men on mopeds and motorbikes would pull up beside us as we raced through the capital Phnom Penh - me clutching Ang's waist, sitting pillion on her moped.
They would take a good, thorough look at my face, and then fall back behind us.
Tales of trafficking
As for the trafficked children, their stories defy words.
A 15-year-old girl in Cambodia said her parents had sold her to a man for her virginity. The man had drugged and raped her whilst she was unconscious.

Girls can unwittingly find themselves put to work on the streetsAfter a week in the hotel room with this man, she was sold onto a brothel. There, she was gang-raped by 10 men posing as clients.
She escaped, by hiding in a rubbish bin, but was then tricked into prostitution again, staying for three years. Eventually she escaped, and knocked on the door of some strangers, who cared for her.
She then made a two-day bus journey to Phnom Penh, where she arrived three months ago.
I also met a chatty, bright and wide-eyed nine-year-old, who, under a mango tree in the countryside, described how she had been kidnapped from the streets of the capital, locked in a house for a month, and made to watch pornography and drink water with human faeces in it.
The traffickers know what they are doing. She and the other girls were beaten regularly and never allowed out - all part of a systematic campaign to break down the children so they were too confused to do anything about it.
These children did not even know what sex or trafficking is, and whether they will ever "recover" from their ordeal is an ongoing debate.

Space computer 'sabotage' probed (bbc)

Nasa is investigating the apparent sabotage of a computer due to be flown to the International Space Station on the Endeavour space shuttle next month.
The US space agency said the damage to wiring in a network box was intentional and obvious, but said it could be repaired before take-off on 7 August.
Nasa stressed that the lives of its astronauts had not been put at risk.
The discovery came as an independent health panel found astronauts had been allowed to fly after drinking alcohol.
The panel found that on two occasions Nasa astronauts had been allowed to fly despite warnings from flight surgeons and other astronauts that they were so drunk they posed a safety risk.
The panel was set up by Nasa to study health issues following the arrest on kidnapping and assault charges of the astronaut, Lisa Nowak.
Ms Nowak is accused of attacking her love rival, the girlfriend of a fellow astronaut.
The findings of the panel, which do not deal with Ms Nowak directly or mention any other astronaut by name, were reported by the trade journal, Aviation Week and Space Technology.
The official review into astronauts' medical and behavioural health is expected to be released by Nasa on Friday.
The agency has so far refused to comment on the allegations.
'Sub-contractor'
Nasa's Associate Administrator for Space Operations, William Gerstenmaier, said the apparent sabotage of a non-essential computer had been discovered earlier this month.
The damage is very obvious, easy to detect
William GerstenmaierNasa Associate Administrator for Space Operations
In graphics: Space station
"The damage is very obvious, easy to detect," he told reporters. "It's not a mystery to us."
Mr Gerstenmaier said wires had been found cut inside the unit before it had been loaded onto the shuttle.
The computer is designed to collect and relay data from sensors which detect vibrations and forces on the space station's external trusses.
"It's currently being investigated by the [Nasa] inspector general's office," he added.
The equipment had been supplied by a sub-contractor, he added.
Mr Gerstenmaier said engineers would try to repair the hardware before take-off in two weeks' time, but that the mission would not be delayed.
The damage is believed to be the first act of sabotage of flight equipment Nasa has discovered. (BBC)

Weapons delays hinder Iraqi army

The US-led coalition in Iraq has failed to deliver more than two-thirds of the equipment it

promised to Iraq's army, the US Defence Department has said.
The Pentagon said only 14.5m of the nearly 40m items of equipment ordered by the Iraqi army had been provided.
The US military commander in charge of training in Iraq has asked for help in speeding up the transfer of equipment.
On Wednesday, Iraq's ambassador to the US said the delays were hindering the fighting capacity of its armed forces.
Samir Sumaidaie said Iraqi troops were often "cannon fodder" for militants.
"There is general frustration in the Iraqi government at the rate at which Iraqi armed forces are being equipped and armed," he said.
"This is a collaborative effort between the Iraqi government and the government of the United States, and the process is not moving quickly enough to improve the fighting capacity of Iraqi armed forces."
"A way must be found to improve this process."
'Challenge'
The Pentagon said it was doing all it could to send out the items, with priority given to equipment that can be used for counter-insurgency.
It's a challenge - you can't do it overnight
Bryan WhitmanPentagon spokesman
It said some deliveries had been delayed by the export licensing process, while others had been affected by changes in orders.
"We share a common goal with the Iraqis that their forces should be equipped with the type of things that they need to include force protection equipment, mobility equipment, communications equipment," Bryan Whitman, a spokesman for the Pentagon, said.
"But it's a challenge. You can't do it overnight," he added.
The chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen Peter Pace, has promised to work on delivering the equipment to the Iraqi forces more quickly in the future.
Last week, Gen Pace was asked by Lt Gen James Dubik, who oversees the training of Iraqi forces, for help in improving the system.
Meanwhile, the latest weekly BBC survey of casualties in Iraq has shown that 416 people were killed in the period ending on Wednesday.
The figure is down considerably on the previous week.
A US military commander in Iraq, Lt-Gen Ray Odierno expressed cautious optimism at a slowing in US casualties, but said attacks on the heavily-fortified Green Zone in Baghdad seemed to be getting more accurate.
The survey is intended to assess the effects of the surge of American troops in Iraq. It is based on figures provided by the US and Iraqi authorities.

Bush bars torture of CIA detainees but what's allowed stays secret

WASHINGTON (AP) -- President Bush breathed new life into the CIA's terror interrogation program Friday in an executive order that would allow harsh questioning of suspects, limited in public only by a vaguely worded ban on cruel and inhuman treatment.

President Bush's executive order bars the humiliation and cruel treatment of terrorism suspects.

The order bars some practices such as sexual abuse, part of an effort to quell international criticism of some of the CIA's most sensitive and debated work. It does not say what practices would be allowed.
The executive order is the White House's first public effort to reach into the CIA's five-year-old terror detention program, which has been in limbo since a Supreme Court decision last year called its legal foundation into question.
"Last September, the president explained how the CIA's program had disrupted attacks and saved lives, and that it must continue on a sound legal footing," White House press secretary Tony Snow said. "The president has insisted on clear legal standards so that CIA officers involved in this essential work are not placed in jeopardy for doing their job -- and keeping America safe from attacks."
Bush saved for the classified files the rules laying out exactly what agency operatives can do to extract information from suspects.
Administration officials cited the need to keep terror groups off-guard. But even some members of Congress seemed confused.
Three Republican senators who were instrumental in drafting legislation on detainee rights -- Sens. John McCain of Arizona, John Warner of Virginia and Lindsey Graham of South Carolina -- said they had been briefed, but still had questions. "We are awaiting a response," they said in a statement.
In the past, the CIA's methods are believed to have included sleep deprivation and disorientation, exposing prisoners to uncomfortable cold or heat for long periods, stress positions and -- most controversially -- the simulated drowning technique known as waterboarding.
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Read the executive order
The Bush administration has portrayed the interrogation operation as one of its most successful tools in the war on terror, while opponents have said the agency's techniques have left a black mark on the United States' reputation around the world.
Bush's order requires that CIA detainees "receive the basic necessities of life, including adequate food and water, shelter from the elements, necessary clothing, protection from extremes of heat and cold, and essential medical care."
A senior intelligence official would not comment directly when asked if waterboarding would be allowed under the new order and under related -- but classified -- legal documents drafted by the Justice Department.
However, the official said, "It would be wrong to assume the program of the past transfers to the future."
A second senior administration official acknowledged sleep is not among the basic necessities outlined in the order.
Both officials spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the order more freely.
Skeptical human rights groups did not embrace Bush's effort.
Tom Malinowski, Washington director for Human Rights Watch, said the broad outlines in the public order don't matter. The key is in the still-classified guidance distributed to CIA officers.
As a result, the executive order requires the public to trust the president to provide adequate protection to detainees, Malinowski said. "Given the experience of the last few years, they have to be naive if they think that is going to reassure too many people," he said.
Leonard Rubenstein, director of Physicians for Human Rights, said the executive order was inadequate.
"What is needed now is repudiation of brutal and cruel interrogation methods. General statements like this are inadequate, particularly after years of evidence that torture was authorized at the highest levels and utilized by U.S. forces," he said.
The five-page order reiterated many protections already granted under U.S. and international law. It said that any conditions of confinement and interrogation cannot include:
• Torture or other acts of violence serious enough to be considered comparable to murder, torture, mutilation or cruel or inhuman treatment.
• Willful or outrageous acts of personal abuse done to humiliate or degrade someone in a way so serious that any reasonable person would "deem the acts to be beyond the bounds of human decency." That includes sexually indecent acts.
• Acts intended to denigrate the religion of an individual.
The order does not permit detainees to contact family members or have access to the International Committee of the Red Cross.
In a decision last year aimed at the military's tribunal system, the Supreme Court required the U.S. government to apply Geneva Convention protections to the conflict with al Qaeda, shaking the legal footing of the CIA's program.
Last fall, Congress instructed the White House to draft an executive order as part of the Military Commissions Act, which outlined the rules for trying terrorism suspects. The bill barred torture, rape and other war crimes that clearly would have violated the Geneva Conventions, but allowed Bush to determine -- through executive order -- whether less harsh interrogation methods can be used.
The administration and the CIA have maintained that the agency's program has been lawful all along.
In a message to CIA employees on Friday, Director Michael Hayden tried to stress the importance and narrow scope of the program. He noted that fewer than 50 detainees have experienced the agency's "enhanced interrogation measures."
"Simply put, the information developed by our program has been irreplaceable," he said. "If the CIA, with all its expertise in counterterrorism, had not stepped forward to hold and interrogate people like (senior al Qaeda operatives) Abu Zubaydah and Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the American people would be right to ask why

frog

The remarkable adhesive abilities of geckos and mussels have been combined to create a super-sticky material.

Unlike other adhesives inspired by the nimble reptiles, "geckel" can attach to both wet and dry surfaces, the team that developed the material says.

Its staying power comes from coating fibrous silicone, similar in structure to a gecko's foot, with a polymer that mimics the "glue" used by mussels.

Writing in Nature, the researchers say it could have medical applications.

"I envision that adhesive tapes made out of geckel could be used to replace sutures for wound closure, and may also be useful as a water-resistant adhesive for bandages and drug-delivery patches," said Professor Phillip Messersmith from Northwestern University in Chicago.

"Such a bandage would remain firmly attached to the skin during bathing but would permit easy removal upon healing."

Other research teams claim they have already produced a gecko-inspired material that works underwater.

Tiny forces

Geckos have an incredible ability to stick to surfaces. Some studies suggest the over-engineered reptiles can hold hundreds of times their own body weight.

Geckos can support hundreds of times their own body weight

In 2000, a University of California team showed that the adhesion was due to very weak intermolecular forces produced by the billions of hair-like structures, known as setae, on each gecko foot.

These "van der Waals" forces arise when unbalanced electrical charges around molecules attract one another.

The cumulative attractive force of billions of setae allows geckos to scurry up walls and even hang upside down on polished glass.

The reptile's grip is only released when it peels its foot off the surface.

The new geckel material exploits this ability but also combines it with the sticking power of mussels.

It consists of a base of densely packed silicone setae coated with a polymer that mimics amino acids found in the "glues" of mussels.

"I was reading a research paper about the drop of adhesion in geckos when [they go] under water, and it hit me: maybe we could apply what we know about mussels to make gecko adhesion work under water," said Professor Messersmith

Tests showed that the material could be stuck and unstuck more than 1,000 times, even when used under water. The researchers said that other materials had only demonstrated "a few contact cycles".

Removing the polymer coating drastically reduced its efficiency.

Sticky tape

Creating a cheap, mass produced adhesive that mimics the sticking power of the cold-blooded gecko has long been a goal of scientists.

In 2003, a team from the University of Manchester produced small quantities of a sticky gecko tape.

Setae allow geckos to scurry up walls and hang upside down

It was produced using electron-beam lithography, where a beam of electrons etches patterns in a surface.

The same technique is used to make geckel but is expensive and difficult to scale-up for mass production.

For example, the pieces of geckel used in the latest experiments were just 60 nanometres (billionths of a metre) in diameter.

"We have demonstrated a proof of concept," said Professor Messersmith.

"The challenge will be to scale up the technology and still have the geckel material exhibit adhesive behaviour."

But last year, researchers at aerospace and defence firm BAE Systems raised hopes of mass production when they showed off centimetre length strips of a plastic, known as Synthetic Gecko.

Sticking plaster

Using a technique known as photo-lithography, common in the silicon industry, they have since been able to scale up production.

"We've now got large pieces," said Dr Sajad Haq, a research scientist at the company's Advanced Technology Centre in Bristol.

Synthetic Gecko is composed of millions of mushroom-shaped hairs

He was unable to reveal the exact size of the sheets as the company has applied for patents on the material.

He also said that they have optimised the design of the nylon-like material, which is covered with millions of tiny mushroom-like hairs.

"We've now got the material working on rough surfaces and wet surfaces, so it does work underwater for example" he said.

Crucially, he said, his team has not had to tweak the design too much to make it work when wet.

"The material we use is still a simple system," he said. "We haven't had to do anything complex to ensure it works underwater."

He also said that, like geckel, Synthetic Gecko could be re-used over and over again.

Once patented, the firm plans to use the material for a range of applications from repair patches for tanks, aircraft and submarines to crawler robots.

"It's becoming more and more practical," he said. "It's getting very close to a high maturity level."

As the Synthetic Gecko research is commercially sensitive, specific details have not yet been published.

news from bbc

Last Updated: Thursday, 19 July 2007, 03:19 GMT 04:19 UK E-mail this to a friend Printable version

Explosion rocks central New York

The blast left a crater in the middle of Lexington Avenue One person has been killed and at least 20 others injured after a steam pipe exploded underneath a street in central New York during the evening rush hour. The explosion in midtown Manhattan sent clouds of steam, mud and rocks into the air and forced the evacuation of nearby streets and Grand Central Station. The New York Police Department said the incident was not terrorism-related. Millions of pounds of steam are pumped beneath the streets of New York to help heat and cool thousands of buildings. In 1989, three people were killed when a steam pipe ruptured in the city. 'Like a volcano' The 83-year-old pipe exploded just before 1800 (2200 GMT) spreading chaos and fear on the streets of Manhattan, with people running from the scene as steam billowed up from the ground. The blast left a crater in the middle of Lexington Avenue and sent clouds of steam, mud and rocks into the air. As I was running I got pelted in the head by rocks and concrete Reggie Evans Two of the injured are reportedly in critical condition. It is still unclear exactly what caused the accident, but it may have been due to cold water entering the pipe or a break somewhere else in the system. It is the largest commercial steam system operated by utility company Consolidated Edison. Firefighters and emergency crews rushed to the area, closing off part of the street between Grand Central and the Chrysler building. Thousands of commuters were evacuated from the rail hub after workers yelled for them to get out. A witness, investment banker Heiko Thieme, said the explosion was like a volcano erupting. "Everybody was a bit confused, everybody obviously thought of 9/11," he told the Associated Press. Reggie Evans also likened the effect to the attacks on the World Trade Center. "I saw rocks and pebbles coming down. As I was running I got pelted in the head by rocks and concrete," he told the Reuters news agency. "Steam came up and then the ground started breaking up." New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg later ruled out the possibility of a terrorist attack. "There is no reason to believe whatsoever that this is anything other than a failure of our infrastructure," he told a press conference. "The big fear that we have is whether there may or may not have been asbestos released." Environmental officials have told local residents and workers to stay out of the area or remain indoors while they undertake tests for the construction fibre that has been used to insulate such pipes in the past.

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