Tim Washburn - Cyber Attack

Sheezal’s stare lingers on Nazeri for an extra moment or two before retaking his seat. After examining the targets for a moment, Sheezal picks an oil refinery near a highly populated area. He likes the fact that he’s targeting the one resource Americans can’t seem to get enough of. More, more, more is all the Americans want, Sheezal thinks, leaving few resources for the billions of other people who occupy this planet. With tentacles stretching throughout the Middle East, the U.S. government sucks up the oil and is more than willing to go to war when their interests are threatened. No, Sheezal doesn’t hate everyone in this country, but he does hate the politicians, the large corporations, and the hypocrisy.

Using the back door that Nazeri provided, Sheezal enters the company’s network and searches through the database of attached devices. He can either target the PLCs that control the multitude of valves inside the plant, go after the pressure sensors, or attack the pumps that move the chemicals through the facility. Hoping an overheated pump might spark a fire, Sheezal chooses the pumps and launches the malware payload targeted specifically at the controllers that regulate pump speeds. Once he has control, he ramps up the speeds on the 142 pumps inside the building and sits back in his chair, waiting for disaster to strike.

Delaware County, Pennsylvania

People drive by it day after day and never give the facility a second thought. Others might drift by the collection of tanks and towers and not wonder about their purpose as they cruise down the scenic Delaware River. And some people will buy or build their homes nearby, never knowing what goes on inside the plant across the road or down the street. There are no regulations or restrictions that prohibit the construction of homes in the vicinity, and most of the residents believe that if it’s okay to build in a certain area, then it must be okay to live there.

If they only knew.

Located on the north bank of the Delaware River and about ten miles west of downtown Philadelphia, Clark Energy’s refinery pumps out 180,000 barrels of refined oil products every day. The chemical elements, or hydrocarbons, in one barrel of crude oil can be used to make gasoline, heating oil, jet fuel, lubricants, waxes, and propane. Which specific product is produced is dependent on the refining process used. The most common procedure, fractional distillation, involves heating the crude to a certain temperature, forcing individual carbon atoms into a gaseous state where the atoms reform, creating a specific product. Further refining follows. The resulting products may then be cracked, reformed, or pumped into a cylinder for vacuum distillation in an attempt to further rearrange the fuel’s molecular structure.

Some refineries, including Clark Energy, use a process called alkylation to boost the octane levels in gasoline. Some communities across the United States have banded together to try and stop this particular process because of the potential dangers to their towns and cities. It’s not the end product that has them upset, it’s the main chemical used in the processing—hydrofluoric acid. A very potent chemical, hydrofluoric acid will dissolve metal, rock, glass, and ceramic, making it a favorite in the movie industry for dissolving human bodies. The one thing it won’t eat through is plastic and that’s how Clark Energy stores this deadly chemical at the plant.

Stored as a liquid, if the hydrofluoric acid were to leak from a refinery, it forms a deadly vapor cloud when exposed to air. Any contact with the vapor cloud could produce serious, painful chemical burns, blindness, and death from asphyxiation.

Today the alkylation unit is up and running and thirty-three-year-old Nolan Carroll is inside the plant’s control room keeping a close eye on the activity. Everything at the plant is computerized and, with a touch of a button or a click of the mouse, Carroll can make adjustments to keep the plant running smoothly.

Carroll and his wife, Melinda, welcomed their second child, a girl, to the world three months ago. It didn’t take the family long to figure out their small apartment was no longer going to work. He and Melinda went house shopping and found a reasonably priced three-bedroom, two-bath home only a mile from the plant. After some negotiating with the sellers, a price was agreed to and the Carroll family moved into their new home two months ago. Working at the plant and knowing the dangers, Nolan fell in love with the selling price of the home and ignored his initial misgivings about the location.

A decision he will live to regret.

He rolls his chair a little to the left for a better look at the video screen that displays hydrofluoric acid levels inside the alkylation unit. The acid levels are rising and the pumps haven’t shut off. Using his computer mouse, Carroll navigates through the company’s computer network and clicks on the programmable logic controller that regulates the pump’s speed and attempts to dial it back. He’s surprised when the pump doesn’t respond to the computer’s commands. He turns to his coworker Jack Sandoval. “What’s up with all the pumps?”

“I don’t know,” Sandoval says. “The computer won’t allow me to adjust the speeds.”

“Same here. Try killing the power to one or two of them and see what happens.”

“I tried. The computer wouldn’t let me do that, either.”

Carroll feels a tingle of panic inch down his spine. Before he can decide on a course of action, the building is rattled by a large explosion that sends shrapnel shredding through the control room. Carroll grabs his cell phone and dives under his desk. After lighting the screen, he quickly punches the speed dial for his wife and waits.

“C’mon, c’mon, answer the phone,” he mumbles as the first tendrils of the vapor enter the control room.

Still off work for her last few days of maternity leave, Melinda Carroll returns home after taking their three-year-old daughter to Mother’s Day Out. Inside, she takes a long look at the mess in the kitchen and decides to rest a moment before tackling that chore. With the baby, Elise, sleeping in her car seat, Melinda sags onto the sofa, exhausted. Yesterday, Elise had been fussy and Melinda had spent a good portion of the night pacing the floors with the baby in her arms, trying to calm her. Melinda picks up a magazine, fans through the pages, and tosses it back on the coffee table. Eventually her eyelids grow heavy and she drifts off to sleep.

Sometime later, Melinda startles awake when her cell phone rings. Disoriented, it takes her a moment to find it. She digs it out of the sofa and looks at the screen to see Nolan is calling and answers.

Instead of his usual hello , Nolan says, “Get out of the house right now.”

“What?” Melinda asks.

“There’s been an accident at the plant. You have to hurry. Leave and head—”

“Nolan? Nolan, are you there?” Now in a panic, Melinda grabs her bag, picks up the car seat with the baby still napping inside, and hurries out of the house. She flings open the car’s back door, snaps in the car seat, and climbs behind the wheel. Burning rubber, she backs out of the drive and gasps when she sees the fiery inferno at the refinery, just down the road. After dropping the car into drive, she slams on the gas. Quickly winding her way through the neighborhood, she glances ahead to see a white cloud of something hovering close to the ground and moving her way. She stops at the intersection and looks back at the plant, her heart hammering in fear for her husband’s safety.

She sniffs and smells a funny odor as the cloud envelops the car. Seconds later, her eyes and lungs begin to sting. Elise wakes and immediately begins screaming as Melinda slams on the gas and steers onto the main road. Hoping to clear the odor and smoke from the car, she triggers her window down.