100pc box scanning at foreign ports may be delayed again

NEW US proposals may extend the deadline for 100 per cent scanning of containers at foreign ports of loading, and give terminals a choice of screening types.

The proposed 2010 Maritime Transportation Security Act would extend the deadline for mandatory scanning of all US-bound containers from 2014 to 2015, said London`s International Freighting Weekly.


What`s more, it would allow containers to be examined using non-intrusive imaging or radiation detection, rather than both.


The 100 per cent scanning requirement has already been delayed by two years as it was supposed to be implemented by 2012.


Another bill was also introduced at the US Senate Committee meeting that would favour a risk-based approach, eliminating the deadline for x-raying 100 per cent of containers, provided the Secretary of Homeland Security certified the effectiveness of individual security measures.


At present technology needed to x-ray 100 per cent of containers has yet to be developed.


US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) said senior DHS and Customs and Border Protection officials had acknowledged in the past that few foreign ports would be able to meet the earlier July 2012 deadline.