A federal bioterror laboratory already under investigation by Congress for safety issues has had repeated incidents of security doors left unlocked to an area where experiments occur with dangerous germs, according to internal agency e-mails. In one incident, an unauthorized employee was discovered inside a restricted area.

A Centers for Disease Control and Prevention spokesman says the unsecured door incidents in 2010 and 2009 inside its Emerging Infectious Diseases Laboratory in Atlanta were "not an acceptable practice of the agency." At no time, though, were bioterror organisms such as anthrax at risk of falling into the wrong hands, he said.

"The doors in question here are but one layer of multiple layers of security when it comes to both the animals and the agents that are worked on," CDC spokesman Tom Skinner said. "The security measures we have in place, without going into detail, make it close to impossible for anyone who doesn't have approved access to the agents to get their hands on them."

The e-mails document doors being left unlocked in the building's high-containment lab block, which includes an animal-holding area and Biosafety Level 3 labs where experiments are done on microbes that can cause serious or potentially fatal diseases and can be spread through the air. Anthrax, monkeypox, dangerous strains of influenza and the SARS virus are examples.

One e-mail by a CDC safety manager describes an unauthorized man discovered in the animal-holding area and multiple doors that were unsecured at the time. Skinner says the man was a CDC scientist but was not immediately able to provide further details about why he was in the restricted area. Skinner said the man was in an outer corridor of the BSL-3 suite of labs.

For safety and security, access to BSL-3 labs is restricted and they are supposed to have special airflow systems designed to help keep organisms inside. Problems with the airflow systems, including a February incident where air briefly blew out of a lab into a "clean" hallway, prompted the House Energy and Commerce Committee this week to launch a bipartisan investigation into safety issues. The committee is examining whether CDC -- which inspects its own labs along with others nationwide that handle bioterror agents -- is complying with federal safety requirements at the lab building, also known as CDC Building 18.

E-mails written by CDC Safety and Occupational Health manager Patrick Stockton indicate the lab has had security lapses that Rutgers University biosafety expert Richard Ebright said may be a "major violation" of security standards for labs that work with potential bioterror agents.

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