Sen. Murray marks opening of Operation Safe Commerce

Sen. Murray marks opening of Operation Safe Commerce    U.S. Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., said Monday the official opening of Operation Safe Commerce, a federal initiative to improve port security being implemented at the ports of Tacoma-Seattle, New York-New Jersey, and Los Angeles-Long Beach.
   As Murray spoke to an audience inside a Port of Tacoma warehouse, several containerships were crossing the Pacific with the first of hundreds of OSC test containers.
   “Data from the initial containers will create a knowledge base for international standards for the secure shipment of containers from the overseas point of origin through the supply chain to the U.S. point of distribution,” spokesmen for the ports of Tacoma and Seattle said in a joint statement.
   The first of the containers will arrive in Puget Sound March 25. After discharge in Tacoma, they will be trucked to inland distribution centers. A couple of days later a second test will deliver a container of industrial machinery from Japan, to be sent via rail to the upper Midwest. Approximately 550 containers will arrive by late summer with electronics, clothing, coffee and foodstuffs.
   The port of Seattle will receive its first OSC containers in mid-April.
   Evaluations of the test containers are being conducted by Pinkerton Consulting & Investigations under contract to the ports of Seattle and Tacoma.