HAZMAT Transportation and Security: Survey and Directions for Future Research

The U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) Office of Hazardous Materials Safety estimates that an average of over 800,000 shipments of hazardous materials (HAZMAT) are made each day in the United States [27]. The DOT also reports that approximately 1.5 billion tons of hazardous materials are shipped each year [26]. The majority of the hazardous material shipped is classified as flammable liquid (e.g. petroleum). Other types of hazardous material include (in decreasing order of annual amount shipped) corrosive materials, gases, flammable solids, toxics and radioactive materials. The DOT also reports statistics on incidents involving hazardous materials shipping and their consequences. For 1999, the DOT reported five fatalities, 217 injured persons, and $23 million in property damage associated with hazardous materials transportation on highways [28]. The above statistics (fortunately) do not include any cases where HAZMAT trucks were intentionally used to attack a vulnerable site. Unfortunately, it is a reality that there is now a risk of such an event occurring and the consequences could be enormous. Whereas HAZMAT incidents occurring as a result of accidents are a risk to people on the road and living near the location where the accident occurs, an explosion or release of hazardous material at a vulnerable site such as a nuclear power plant or large population water source can greatly amplify the amount of people at risk. In the past, HAZMAT routes have only been planned to be sufficiently far away from such sites that if an accident occurred on the route the site would not be affected. But the possibility of a rogue driver whose intent is to attack a vulnerable site makes that approach inadequate. Routing decisions are needed that minimize the probability of a successful attack, and these decisions must be made in conjunction with decisions on how to defend the vulnerable sites.