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BAGHDAD - Iraqi security forces seized 200 explosive belts along the Syrian border Wednesday, a police spokesman said, reinforcing Baghdad's claims that its western neighbor isn't doing enough to stop the flow of fighters and weapons to al-Qaida in Iraq. The belts were found during a search of a truck that had crossed into Iraq from Syria at the Waleed border station, Interior Ministry spokesman Maj. Gen. Abdul-Karim Khalaf said. "When the truck was searched, 200 explosives belts were found in it," the general said. He said the driver was detained but he would not give his name or nationality....

COLUMBUS, Wis. (AP) - April 17, 2007 - - It's not often that a bomb squad is asked to help clean up a pharmacy. But experts say a 2-ounce sample of picric acid in the basement of Sharrow Drug Store packed the punch of nearly half a stick of dynamite. Store employees found the sample Thursday as they were cleaning out old chemicals. Store owner Nick Sharrow is relieved that the local bomb squad safely destroyed the sample Friday, saying its explosive capability was stunning. "This is very similar to TNT," Sharrow said.

FLAGLER BEACH, Fla. -- A Flagler Beach swimmer's discovery of a box marked "grenade" with 18 live shells inside prompted authorities to evacuate five homes, two businesses and close several nearby streets Monday night, according to police. Officers said the woman swimmer found the ammunition-size box containing the explosives on South 19th Street and South Oceanshore Boulevard. Police said she put the container with explosives in her car and traveled to a phone and called for help. When Flagler County fire officials arrived, they noticed the package and called the Volusia County bomb squad. "The box had "grenade" written on...

CAMP ELLIS, Iraq (March 7, 2007) -- Explosive Ordnance Disposal Marines attached to the California-based Battalion Landing Team 2nd Marines, 4th Marine Regiment have supported current operations in the Barwanah area by disposing of weapons and explosives found in caches throughout the area. To date, EOD has disposed of more than 2,000-plus pounds of weapons and explosives since operations began here in late November. According to Gunnery Sgt. Aaron M. Salyi, EOD chief from Combat Logistics Battalion 15 attached to BLT 2/4, the weeks in Barwanah have not slowed much since the beginning of operations. Though the weapons caches have...

THREE suspected Pakistani militants have been blown to pieces by their explosives when they rode over a bump on a bicycle outside a town in the central province of Punjab. "The head of one man has been blown off," Deputy Superintendent Bashir Ahmed said. Another of the dead men had his legs blown off, while the third had his stomach ripped open and died later in hospital, police said. Supt. Ahmed said at least two of the dead men were students at a nearby madrasa, suspected of having links to Sipah-e-Sahaba Pakistan, a banned Sunni Muslim sectarian group. Pakistan is...

NORTH PLATTE, Neb. - Brian Bruggeman caused a stink at the Lincoln County Jail earlier this month and will now have to answer for it in court. Another inmate, Jesse Dorris, alleges that Bruggeman's flatulence, passed in close proximity to Dorris, sparked a Dec. 14 fight between the two at the jail. Now Bruggeman, 38, faces a Jan. 11 preliminary hearing on the state's complaint of assault by a confined person. It's a felony punishable by up to five years in prison. Bruggeman is accused of injuring Dorris, his cellmate, when he pushed him into cell bars. Dorris, 26, was...

WASHINGTON, Sept. 7, 2006 – DoD is spending almost $3.5 billion this year to defeat improvised explosive devices, and the effort’s leader today said he expects the same level of funding in fiscal 2007. Retired Army Gen. Montgomery C. Meigs said the Joint IED Defeat Organization is using an all-encompassing approach to counter the threat of IEDs, terrorists’ main weapon in attacks against coalition forces and civilians in Iraq and Afghanistan. In Iraq alone, IEDs have killed almost 1,000 servicemembers. There is no “silver bullet” solution to the leading cause of death for coalition troops, Meigs told media during a...

Three factories in Iran are mass-producing the sophisticated roadside bombs used to kill British soldiers over the border in Iraq, it has been claimed.The lethal bombs are being made by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps at ordnance factory sites in Teheran, according to opponents of the country's theocratic regime. Designed to penetrate heavy armour, the devices being manufactured in Iran involve the use of "explosively formed projectiles" or EFPs, also known as shaped charges, often triggered by infra-red beams.The weapons can pierce the armour of British and American tanks and armoured personnel carriers and completely destroy armoured Land Rovers, which...

Tens of thousands of travellers in Britain have been stranded or left to wait in crowded airports as heightened security sparked by an alleged plot to blow up US bound planes from the UK has wreaked havoc in the international air traffic network. British Home Secretary John Reid says police are confident that the main suspects in the plot "have been accounted for" but has explained that the country's security alert had been raised to its highest level, "critical", as a precautionary measure. British anti-terrorist police say the plot involved explosives concealed in hand luggage. Many airlines have cancelled flights...

Q&A: Liquid explosives An alleged plot to blow up planes from the UK mid-flight and cause "mass murder on an unimaginable scale" has been disrupted, Scotland Yard has said. It is thought the plan was to detonate explosive devices smuggled in hand luggage on to as many as 10 aircraft. BBC security correspondent Gordon Corera said the plan "revolved around liquids of some kind". One theory is that the attack may have involved liquid explosive being carried on to a plane in either drink bottles or cans. Dr Clifford Jones, an explosives expert from the University of Aberdeen, says even...

BOMBAY, India - A powerful military explosive — one often used by Islamic militants fighting in India's part of Kashmir — was used in last week's Bombay train bombings, investigators said Monday. Indian officials have linked the attacks that killed 182 people to Pakistan, and the use of RDX explosives is a hallmark of the militants, who get at least a degree of support from Islamabad in their fight to wrest the predominantly Muslim Kashmir from India. "The explosive used was a mixture of ammonium nitrate, RDX and fuel oil," said K.P. Raghuvanshi, who leads the anti-terrorist squad investigating the...

Atmospheric 'sprites' captured in explosive detail 18:28 16 February 2006 NewScientist.com news service Kimm Groshong Sprites are rare and fleeting events, lasting between just 10 and 100 milliseconds (Image: Steven A Cummer, Duke University) Mysterious flashes of light called “sprites", that occur above thunderclouds during powerful storms, have been captured on film in unprecedented detail by researchers using an ultra-high-speed camera. The best images yet of the flashes – which resemble a giant undulating jellyfish with its tentacles falling from a halo of light – have allowed the team to pick apart their structure and mechanics. Sprites are fleeting events,...

HIT, Iraq (Jan. 14, 2006) -- For four long, backbreaking days, Marine combat engineers and infantrymen unearthed cache after cache of insurgent ordnance and weaponry in and around Hit, Iraq during Operation Hedgehog. Marines from the Combat Engineer Platoon, Battalion Landing Team 1st Bn., 2nd Marines kicked off the operation with a search of long-suspected hide sites throughout Hit and soon began unearthing treasure troves of insurgent arms. “This was our biggest find to date,” said 1st Lt. Antonio Agnone, the combat engineer platoon leader for BLT 1/2. “We’ve uncovered numerous, and significant caches the insurgents have hidden in Hit...

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WASHINGTON, Jan. 8, 2006 – Iraqi police in Mosul discovered an improvised explosive device yesterday, officials announced today. When an explosive ordnance detachment approached the IED to investigate, both the Iraqi police guarding it and the EOD were attacked by small-arms fire. EOD destroyed the IED, and no injuries or damages were reported. In other action, U.S. soldiers from Task Force Baghdad captured a suspected terrorist believed to be responsible for emplacing IEDs Jan. 6. Later in the day, another U.S. patrol detained a suspected terrorist with a book that described how to attack American soldiers and justified collateral damage...

FAIRCHILD AFB, Wa., Nov. 16, 2005 — Explosive ordnance disposal personnel worked hand-in-hand with multiple federal agencies at the Grand Coulee Dam, Oct. 4 - 6, for an exercise titled "Watchful Sentinel." "The focus of the exercise was to evaluate Special Response Forces standard operation procedures, along with coordination between the Special Response Forces and supporting agencies, via a series of realistic events," said U.S. Air Force Tech. Sgt. Jack Burleigh, explosive ordnance disposal craftsman, 92nd Civil Engineering Squadron. "Some of the calls we respond to involve ordnance left behind in a deceased veteran's war chest. Other times, we may...

Truck Carrying Explosives Blows Up in Utah Wednesday, August 10, 2005 SALT LAKE CITY — A tractor-trailer carrying 35,500 pounds of explosives overturned and exploded Wednesday, injuring four people and leaving a huge crater on Utah Highway 6 in Spanish Fork Canyon. A motorist and a passenger in the truck's cab were among those transported to hospitals immediately after the 1:54 p.m. accident, Utah Highway Patrol Sgt. Todd Royce said. LDS Hospital spokesman Jess Gomez said two person in critical condition were taken by medical helicopter to Utah Valley Regional Medical Center (search) in Provo. A third was brought in...

The U.S. Army's Buffalo boasts a robotic arm tipped with a pitchfork-like hand and a camera for seeing into hard-to-reach areas during the search for improvised explosive devices. BAGHDAD, Iraq, Aug. 10, 2005 — Looking like a creation from the TV show “Monster Garage,” 1st Battalion, 64th Armor’s Buffalo lumbers down the streets of Baghdad, searching for improvised explosive devices. The Buffalo stands far taller than a tank and boasts a robotic arm tipped with a pitchfork-like hand and a camera for seeing into hard-to-reach areas. “We travel slowly along our routes, looking out the windows for anything suspicious,” said...

Explosives unit headed back into Iraqi fray By ERICA WALSH About 20 Fort Knox soldiers are on their way to Iraq, some for a second time in two years. The 703rd Explosive Ordnance Disposal Detachment from Fort Knox left for Iraq on Saturday morning, family members said. This is the second deployment for the Fort Knox detachment, which spent September 2003 to March 2004 in Iraq. The unit is responsible for finding, recovering and disposing of explosive devices. About half of the group that left for Iraq Saturday also deployed to the country during the unit's first trip. The soldiers...

The world's Terror Network has been given a new weapon. It can overcome the most stringent of airport and airline security checks. Far more lethal than Semtex, it can be smuggled with virtual impunity from one country to another, one terrorist cell to another. For the 80 terror groups listed on the computers of the CIA, MI5, MI6 and Germany's BND, the weapon once more tips the scales in their favour. It is a new type of plastic explosive that was used by the two young British radical Muslims in last week's suicide bomb attack on the club in Tel...