Rural runs: NHP transports important materials across vast stretches of state

Jace Radke

Tuesday, March 11, 2003 | 11:07 a.m.

Nevada Highway Patrol Capt. Chris Perry didn't know for sure what he was hauling in his trunk March 1 as he guided his cruiser through the desert toward Tonopah as hail and rain pounded down.

"I knew that the Clark County Health District thought it was ricin or some kind of poison and that it can kill you if you ingest it, inject it or inhale it," Perry said. "I put the sealed container in the trunk, and promised them I wouldn't lick it."

On March 1, a Las Vegas man committed suicide by injecting a small amount of a substance that was positively identified Monday as ricin, a powerful toxin derived from the castor bean plant.

A vial of the poison was discovered in the man's home, and after hundreds of emergency personnel responded to the incident, it fell to the NHP, and Perry, to transport the substance to the state health lab in Reno for analysis.

Making emergency runs like this one is all in a day's work, highway patrol officials said.

"When all else fails they call us," said Trooper Jim Olschlager, an NHP spokesman. "We run everything from blood and organs to crime scene reports and evidence. It's part of working in a state that is this size with the two main population centers spread more than 400 miles apart.

"State Police in Massachusetts never have to worry about this kind of stuff."

At 110,567 square miles -- much of it open desert -- Nevada is the seventh-largest state in terms of area, and that means a lot of travel for the state police.

Perry now jokes about the driving the ricin to Tonopah, but he did have concerns as he drove north on U.S. 95.

"It was a horrible day for driving," Perry said. "There was snow on the Goldfield summit, and I had this stuff in the trunk.

"The dangers are always at the back of your mind, and that's probably why I took it instead of exposing one of my guys to it."

The Nevada Civil Air Patrol flies many deliveries of blood and organs, but inclement weather anywhere in their flight path means that the NHP gets the ball, Olschlager said.

Bad weather and the fact that the ricin was considered evidence ruled out the Civil Air Patrol as a possible delivery service on March 1.

Perry was called at about 8 a.m. and was on the road to Tonopah in his blue Ford Crown Victoria with the ricin by 12:30 p.m. Health District personnel sealed the vial of ricin and other evidence inside a one-gallon bucket and a five-gallon bucket, health district spokeswoman Jennifer Sizemore said.

The two waterproof plastic buckets were loaded into Perry's trunk, and after wrapping a blanket around them he was on his way. Perry arrived in Tonopah, 210 miles northwest of Las Vegas, at about 4 p.m., and passed the buckets to a lieutenant who took them the remaining 238 miles to Reno.

As it turned out, the lab in Reno did not have the ability to analyze the toxin, so the task fell upon the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The CDC ruled Monday that it was indeed ricin, which is so strong that a dose the size of a grain of salt can kill an adult.

Transporting dangerous substances to Reno should come to an end this fall when a new state public health lab is scheduled to open in Las Vegas, Sizemore said.

The lab will be located at the health district's Shadow Lane complex off Charleston Boulevard. The lab will cost more than $2 million in federal funds that were allocated to the district last year.

While Perry had a few hours to prepare for his trip to Tonopah, most troopers don't get as much notice when they have to make an emergency delivery, Olschlager said.

"Usually you're out on patrol and you get the call," Olschlager said. "I had one where a guy was literally on the operating table in Phoenix and they needed a rare blood type and Las Vegas was the closest repository.

"I ran the blood out to the Boulder City Airport and they flew it the rest of the way."

In that instance Olschlager was "rolling code," or driving at high speeds with lights and sirens blaring.

"You know somebody is counting on that blood, so you just try to get there safely and on time," Olschlager said.

Perry purposely did not use his sirens or speed while transporting the ricin in order to decrease the chances of a crash that could have spilled the biological agent.

Other times, the NHP may be transporting something as mundane as confidential reports or evidence that may be needed in Reno or one of the smaller, rural counties.

"It's still a lot faster than mail or UPS if we just jump in the car and take it where it needs to go," Olschlager said. "Sometimes they need it before the next day, and sometimes there is a chain of custody that has to maintained on evidence."

Dealing with long drives comes with the job for troopers whose headquarters and training facilities are in Carson City.

"We deal with the long drives just like everyone else does," Olschlager said. "We get some caffeine and crank the AC/DC on the tape deck. Of course if you get an older car without a tape deck you end up making good friends with the dispatcher."