INCENDIARY DEVICES
On fire T
he terrorist will always look for new off -radar precursor chemicals with which to manufacture homemade explosives (HME). However,
in a European context, as security forces and members of the public become more vigilant, attempting to acquire large quantities of HME precursors is a high-risk activity. Manufacturing HME is also a very
hazardous process in the absence of an expert and a number of bomb-makers have been killed or injured by premature explosions. In recent years, probably in response to lack of HME manufacturing expertise and the security environment, extremists have been using fl ammable liquids and gas as a substitute for explosives or as a perceived enhance- ment to HME main charges. The Provisional IRA (PIRA) allegedly
tried to perfect a fuel-air IED in Colum- bia, alongside members of the Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia (FARC) in 2001 and in Northern Ireland, bomb disposal offi cers recovered gas cylinders from a car abandoned outside Crossmaglen police station on 4 April 2010. The car bomb was believed to be the work of dissident republicans. Signifi cant loss of life occurred on 11
April 2002, when an al-Qaeda suicide volunteer carried out a VBIED attack on a Tunisian synagogue. The truck bomb containing fl ammable gas and explosives smashed through security barriers and was initiated by the suicide bomber. The ensuing blast/fi reball killed fi ſt een people and injured dozens more.
Tiger Tiger On 29 June 2007, Dr Bilal Abdulla is alleged to have parked a Mercedes
40 CBNW 2013/01
containing 200 litres of petrol, at least one 13kg fl ammable patio heater gas bottle and boxes of roofi ng nails outside the Tiger Tiger nightclub in London. In the early hours of 29 June, hundreds of young people enjoying a drink in the club were unaware that the extremist wanted to create a fi reball to kill and injure hundreds of partygoers. Fortunately the device failed to function. During a follow-up search police
discovered a second vehicle nearby, containing a similar device. The next day Abdulla and two accomplices attempted to ram a Jeep Grand Cherokee into the terminal at Glasgow airport. The perpetrators were unable to breach through the fabric of the building and again the vehicle, with its payload of petrol, fl ammable gas and nails failed to explode in a fi reball as intended. A few years prior to the London
and Glasgow attacks, the UK security services had mounted an extensive surveillance operation (Operation RHYME), against Dhiren Barot. He was an al-Qaeda convert, born in India and had been living in the UK for most of his life. Following his arrest in 2004 on terrorism charges, UK security services discovered that he was planning various attacks in the UK, including one entitled the ‘gas limos project’. It was his intention to place 12-13 gas bottles into limousines and fabricate an initiation system to produce a large fi reball. Recognising the risks involved with the procurement of HME precursors, Barot produced a lengthy report about using fl ammable gas as an IED main charge. He discussed fuel-air mixtures and boiling liquid expanding vapour explosions (BLEVE) in his meticulous study.
John Allison tackles the fl ammable gas and IED threat
Fuel-air and thermobarics It is assessed that many terrorist groups around the world have tried to design and fabricate IEDs that can replicate the explosive characteristics of fuel-air munitions, increasingly fi elded by modern armies. The deployment of such weapons has been widely reported in open sources and therefore has almost certainly come to the attention of terrorist groupings. Technical data is also freely available online, to those who wish to study the subject in greater detail. Russian forces in Chechnya used
fuel-air/thermobaric bombs to great eff ect against militants in Grozny in 2000, and in more recent times, Coalition Forces are believed to have used them in Afghani- stan in order to dislodge Taliban fi ghters from well fortifi ed cave complexes. The terrorist could also be inspired by various industrial accidents that have occurred around the world. The term fuel-air, is frequently
associated, oſt en wrongly, with a terrorist incident involving an IED consisting of fl ammable material and explosives. In the defence community the term ‘volumetric’ refers to any munition or device that produces a large fi reball and signifi cant blast eff ect when it functions. Fuel-air, thermobaric and Enhanced Blast Explosives (EBX) can be found within the volumetric weapon category. Fortunately, producing a fuel-air device is not a simple process and it is probably beyond the reach of opportunists or extremist groupings with limited resources and testing facilities. A high number of terrorist devices consisting of fl ammable gas and liquids fail to produce signifi cant fi reball or blast eff ects. That said, in the urban environment or in crowded places the
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