Divers train to find mines
By ROBIN FITZGERALD

THE SUN HERALD

GULFPORT - Divers lowered themselves into pitch-black water Friday at the state Port of Gulfport, searching for explosive devices beneath a 650-foot Greek flagship.

The devices were dummies, part of an anti-terrorist training program sponsored by the Department of Homeland Security. The class had three divers from the Gulfport Fire Department and divers from the New Orleans Police Department and the Orleans Parish Sheriff's Department.

A-T Solutions, an anti-terrorist training company, is teaching the course at 20 major ports around the nation, said Bill Kirk, the company's West Coast director. The course teaches public safety divers to search for explosive devices under vessels, piers and other maritime structures, to identify them and mark them until a Navy specialist can arrive to defuse them.

"It was an overwhelmingly huge vessel, its propeller as big as a truck, and like a blackout condition, not being able to see your hands in front of your face," said Gulfport firefighter Brian Sullivan. "We had to do everything by touch in two-man teams tied to the boat."

The divers trained for three days in New Orleans, and spent Thursday and Friday participating in mock exercises prepared for with help from U.S. Customs, port employees and the Gulfport Fire Department.

As divers went underneath the ore-loading vessel, they worked in darkness and communicated by touch with a squeeze on the leg or arm, Sullivan said.

"One squeeze, stop; two, go. Three squeezes, go to the top. Four, I've found a device, and five, let's get out of here fast."

His father, Gulfport Fire Chief Pat Sullivan, said the training prepares divers to protect the port and the community.

"When cruise ships were coming in and the national security level was raised from yellow to orange, the Coast Guard asked us to have divers check the piers and the ships," he said. "We had to call in divers from other areas because we didn't have the specialized training. We do now."