Security alert for New Year celebrations

The US will be seeing in the New Year amid the tightest-yet security, with the nation’s terrorism alert on its second-highest level.

Military helicopters will be patrolling over the Rose Parade, Times Square and the Las Vegas Strip.

“These aircraft are equipped to dismantle or disrupt any kind of ground attack,” said Las Vegas’ Sheriff Bill Young, “and also other aircraft that would attempt to fly into our airspace.”

Sharpshooters will be posted on hotel-casino roofs, and streets will be blocked off with concrete barricades. Sightseeing helicopters will be grounded from 9pm today to 3am tomorrow.

In Pasadena, where thousands gather along the five and a half-mile Rose Parade route and attend the Rose Bowl football game on New Year’s Day, video surveillance cameras will watch the spectators lining the streets.

Flights over the Rose Bowl will be limited to police and military aircraft, and everyone working in the stadium, from hot-dog sellers to TV camera crews, will be required to wear photo IDs.

“I think the level of security this time around within the United States is absolutely unprecedented,” Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge said on CBS’s The Early Show last night.

In New York City, the New Year’s Eve preparations included flight restrictions and military helicopter patrols over Times Square.

Police Commissioner Ray Kelly said there would be more officers on duty this year than last, and that they would focus more heavily on hotels, landmarks and ferry terminals. He would not disclose numbers.

Organisers said they expected this year’s crowd to be larger than last year’s gathering of 750,000.

Manhole covers are being sealed shut in Times Square, and postboxes, rubbish bins and newspaper boxes are being removed. Plainclothes officers will mingle with the crowds, and elite counter-terror teams will have equipment to detect chemical, biological or radiological contamination.

New Jersey governor James McGreevey warned revellers heading to New York City to expect long delays at bridges and tunnels and to prepare for random stops and searches.

New York mayor Michael Bloomberg said the city was well-protected.

“Sadly, terrorism is something that we have to live with,” he said. “Leave the worrying to the professionals.”

In New Orleans, security officials implemented a new game plan for the Sugar Bowl, where Oklahoma and Louisiana State University will play for college football’s Bowl Championship Series title game on Sunday.

Superdome parking garages will be closed and a fence will be put up around the dome. Some streets will be closed.