FBI Director Fears 9/11-Style Attack On US

The outgoing head of the FBI fears another 9/11-style attack on the US, saying the fallout from the Arab Spring has bred a number of "violent extremists".

Robert Mueller, who leaves his post on September 4, said that he fears terrorists will target planes, or attack America using a weapon of mass destruction.

He warned that the US does not have the capability to defend a cyberattack on the country's energy sector.

Mr Mueller said: "I always say my biggest worry is ... an attack on a plane. And secondly, it's a weapon of mass destruction in the hands of a terrorist and that includes a cyber capability that trumps the defences that we have."

The FBI director said terrorism has shifted from Osama bin Laden's global brand in the aftermath of the 2001 attacks to splintering threats arising in the fallout from Middle East uprisings.

He said: "Every one of these countries now has cadres of individuals who you would put in the category of extremists, violent extremists, and that will present threats down the road."

Mr Mueller, who started as FBI head a week before 9/11, has been credited as the architect of the bureau's transformation into a terrorism-fighting agency in his 12 years at the helm.

He said: "I had in my own mind some ideas about where the bureau needed to go and then a week later we had September 11.

"I did not expect I would be spending my time preventing terrorist attacks." 

During Mr Mueller's time at the bureau US authorities have had dealt with significant terror threats and attacks, including theunderpants flight bomber in 2009 and the cargo plane printer bomb threat in 2010.

He has also dealt with the Boston Marathon bombing, and the 2009 shooting that killed 13 and injured more than 30 at Fort Hood, Texas.

Speaking to reporters at the FBI headquarters, Mr Mueller also defended the National Security Agency's classified surveillance programmes, exposed by whistle-blower Edward Snowden.

He said it was "tremendously important to the protection, not only from terrorist attacks, but from other threats to the United States".

Mr Mueller made the comments on the same day that a new round of revelations about the surveillance showed that the NSA scooped up as many as 56,000 emails and other communications annually over three years by Americans not connected to terrorism.

The director's last day on the job is September 4. His successor, former Justice Department official James Comey, will be on hand next week for the transition.

UPS Plane Crash In Alabama Kills Two

A large UPS cargo plane has crashed on approach to an airport in Birmingham, Alabama, killing the pilot and co-pilot.

The pre-dawn crash caused at least two explosions, throwing debris across the area.

The plane caught fire, sending a column of thick smoke into the sky as fire trucks and other emergency vehicles rushed to the scene.

Birmingham Fire Chief Ivor Brooks said the pilot and the co-pilot, the only two people aboard the aircraft, were killed. He said both were pronounced dead at the scene of the crash.

No other casualties have been reported.

Chief Brooks said the blaze was extinguished by late morning.

The Federal Aviation Administration said the A300 plane - en route from Louisville, Kentucky, to Birmingham - crashed on approach to Birmingham-Shuttlesworth International Airport at around 5am local time.

The plane went down in an open field that is just outside the perimeter fence of the airport.

Nearby, grass was blackened near the bottom of a hill, and a piece of the fuselage and an engine were visible on the hill's crest and smoke could be seen rising from the other side.

The crash had not affected airport operations, though it did appear to topple a tree and a utility pole. The top was broken out of the tree and there were pieces of a utility pole and limbs in the road.

Birmingham Mayor William Bell said: "The plane is in several sections.

"There were two to three small explosions, but we think that was related to the aviation fuel."

The National Transportation Safety Board sent a team to investigate the crash.

The AP news agency said conditions in the area were rainy with low clouds in the early morning.

Sharon Wilson, who lives near the airport, said she was in bed before dawn when she heard what sounded like engines sputtering as the plane went over her house.

"It sounded like an airplane had given out of fuel. We thought it was trying to make it to the airport. But a few minutes later we heard a loud `boom,"' she said.

Another resident, Jerome Sanders, lives directly across from the runway. He said he heard a plane just before dawn and could see flames seconds before it crashed.

"It was on fire before it hit," Mr Sanders said.

Atlanta-based UPS said in a statement that "as we work through this difficult situation, we ask for your patience, and that you keep those involved in your thoughts and prayers".

Previously, a UPS cargo plane crashed on September 3, 2010, in the United Arab Emirates, just outside Dubai.

Both pilots were killed. Authorities there blamed the crash on its load of between 80,000 to 90,000 lithium batteries, which are sensitive to temperature.

Investigators found that a fire on board likely began in the cargo containing the batteries.

Airbus, which quit building the A300 in 2007, said in a news release the plane that crashed in Alabama was built in 2003 and had logged about 11,000 flight hours over 6,800 flights.