NJ Locations Searched In Connection With Terror Attacks; Airport Shut Down Again

FBI agents searched the vacated room of a boardwalk artisan for about 12 hours, according to neighbors. The Thunderbird Motel was evacuated from about 8:30 p.m. Thursday to 3 a.m. Friday, said handyman Eric Stout, 32, who lives next door to the room that was searched.

FBI Special Agent Sandra Carroll confirmed, "We went there thinking it had a connection to the bombing." She said she could not immediately disclose the results of the search.

The search was focused on apartment 4, a ground-floor unit in the smaller of the two yellow stucco buildings that comprised the motel, which in the winter is mainly used for long-term rentals.

Seaside Heights Borough Police Chief Jim Costello said agents told him they received a tip _ generated by the Arizona FBI _ that an "acquaintance" of one suspected hijacker was staying at the Thunderbird motel on Kearney Avenue.

"They don't know what's there, if firearms are there or explosives are there or if anything is there," Costello said.

In Weehawken, agents also searched the warehouse owned by a Fair Lawn man whose van was seized by police on Route 3 in East Rutherford hours after Tuesday's terrorist attacks.

Officers had visited the warehouse Tuesday night, surveying it from the outside with bomb-sniffing dogs, then went inside on Thursday, The Star-Ledger of Newark reported.

About a dozen plainclothes officers, including investigators from the Bergen County Sheriff's Department, entered Urban Moving Systems at about 8 p.m. and began snapping pictures.

A few hours later, agents emerged from the building with more than 12 computer hard drives and files, piling them into the rear of a black Chevy Suburban, the newspaper reported.

It was not immediately known whether the five men who were in the van and detained by authorities Tuesday night were employees of Urban Moving Systems. They were being held Thursday while immigration officials checked their residency status.

Business owner Dominik Suter, who was at the building when agents searched it, refused to comment.

The search for clues took place as Newark International Airport slowly resumed operations amid heightened security after its unprecedented evacuation Tuesday morning.

The company that staffs Newark airport checkpoints for United, Argenbright Security of Atlanta, was fined $1 million last year in connection with the hiring of employees with criminal records and inadequate training at the Philadelphia airport from 1995 to 1998.

Neither Argenbright spokesman Brian Lott nor United spokeswoman Jenna Ludgate would say Thursday how long Argenbright has provided security for the airline at Newark.

The Federal Aviation Administration could not immediately say how many, if any, security violations it had cited Argenbright for at Newark.

On Wednesday, FBI agents searched the Marriott Hotel at the airport because they believed some of the hijackers of Flight 93 may have stayed there Monday night, according to WNBC-TV in New York and The Star-Ledger of Newark.

Agents also searched an outlet of Mail Boxes Etc. in Fort Lee, and left about 8 p.m. Wednesday carrying a box of papers, the newspaper said.

Authorities declined to confirm those searches.

Marriott spokesman Tom Marder said, "We're aware of authorities' interest there." He declined to comment further.

Mail Boxes Etc. spokesman Rich Hallabrin said, "All I can say is that we are cooperating with law enforcement officials in their ongoing investigation."

(Copyright 2001 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)

Last Updated: Sep 14, 2001