Bomb Scare at Port of LA

Traffic of cargo was disrupted at the Port of Los Angeles on Wednesday when workers spotted a shipping container with the word “bomb” spray-painted across it.

Workers of the Port of LA, the busiest container port in the US, stumbled upon the suspicious container as they were unloading the APL Belgium cargo ship on Wednesday afternoon.  The 20-person crew of the 67,500 DWT, Singapore-flagged APL Belgium was evacuated from the port as a precaution.  Port spokesman, Phillip Sanfield, said that around 10% of the port was forced to shut down and be cordoned off for LA Police Department’s bomb squad, sniffing dogs, and other investigative agencies. 

Sanfield said “bomb” was sprayed onto the container in a couple areas, and that while the busy port sees all sorts of off cargo, it’s very unusual to come across graffiti on a container like that. 

Police spokesman deemed there was no threat to the port in correlation to the suspicious container following investigation. 

The mishap did, however, manage to gnarl cargo traffic at two of the port’s eight container terminals.