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Yankee Classic: US/Canadian Border Crossings 25 Years Ago

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(page 4 of 6)

The magnetic sensors, about the size and shape of a large Thermos bottle, are buried in the ground near roads and along trails through woods. So sensitive they can detect a belt buckle or a shoe nail 30 feet away, they emit microwave signals when triggered. A thin antenna, which looks like a reed and is the only part of the device above the ground, sends the signal to Swanton's communications room where it causes a light to flash on the panels. "See where the road forks?" asks Chevalier, pointing to a blue line that branch... "We have sensors along both roads so we can tell which way the subject is moving. If they go away from the port of entry, where they should register after crossing the border, then we know they are trying to sneak into the United States."

Seismic and infrared sensors work in much the same way. Judiciously hidden along routes used for illegal entry, they can monitor the amount and direction of illegal activity. "The best devices we've developed, however," says Chevalier, "are the closed-circuit television cameras. Our technicians thought of using them two years ago, and we were the first sector in the country to use them. Soon we'll have a new kind of camera. It's so sensitive it can show the rungs on a barn's ladder from across the lake in a thunderstorm at night. The pictures will come directly to monitors here in this room. Each one of these cameras will equal six or seven patrolmen for an equivalent amount of observation and effectiveness."

For the most part, however, sensors are not directly responsible for apprehensions. They are used to predict where and when aliens are entering the United States. "It's an ever-changing game," says agent Kruhm, "and with a limited force, good will is a necessity. Local contacts count for a lot, and a good agent will be a friend to the people in his sector. He should know who wants to be friendly and who wants to be left alone. But it's hard to know who is what sometimes. One of my best contacts is the gruffest, grouchiest, most cantankerous farmer I've met here."

The Border Patrol's surveillance has benefited by the addition of television, sensors, and computers. It has also employed subtraction to increase its chances of nabbing infiltrators. Last August a brouhaha was raised when NBC news reported that the infamous "Agent Orange" - the dioxin-containing defoliant of the Vietnam War - had been used along the U.S.-Canadian border.

The State of Maine promptly collected soil samples which it had analyzed by an independent laboratory, but no trace of Agent Orange was discovered. However, the International Boundary Commission (IBC) asked the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to investigate. On August 10 Michael F. Wood of the Compliance Monitoring Staff, Office of Pesticides and Toxic Substances, conducted an inspection at the IBC's office at the U.S. Department of State. He reported that "from 1956/7 to 1977 the International Boundary Commission used herbicides as part of their activity in maintaining a 20-foot vista between boundary monuments along the United States-Canadian border." He noted that a "review of IBC records and discussion and interview with Mr. Moore, Engineer of the Commission, did not reveal any use of Agent Orange." He also reported that Mr. Moore had said that purchase records had been thrown out or archived, since six years had elapsed since the last use of herbicides on the border. And he pointed out that Agent Orange was never registered in the United States and was never commercially available in this country.