IED in Brownsville

[KD5NRH]

Normally, you'd expect an IED on US soil to be big news.

http://www.krgv.com/news/local/story/Investigators-Still-Trying-To-Find-Out-Who-Left/HqlQ4bpSvEKJVsd5JC8PCg.cspx

BROWNSVILLE - Police say the IED found on Highway 77 near the FM 1732 exit in Brownsville was a homemade device and not functional.

Authorities say the pineapple grenade casing was modified to be an IED.  They say the device was poorly constructed and would have caused minimal damage if it had exploded. There also was no detonator on the device.

Police say no one was in any real danger at the time the explosive was found and the expressway was shut down. The device was safely detonated by a bomb squad robot.

Authorities are now trying to figure out how the grenade got there.

A driver heading south on Expressway 77 saw the device Sunday evening on the shoulder and called police. Police are talking to the driver to try to gather any more information about the device.

The FBI and ATF are assisting in the investigation.

If anyone has any information about the device, call Brownsville Crime Stoppers at 956-546-TIPS.

[MicroBalrog]

Failed home-made bombs are not newsworthy.

[RoadKingLarry]

I wonder...

Of course with the ATF's track record sure it could have exploded if we install a detonator and some explosives and a trigger mechanism. Sort of like how they like to define a machine gun.

Probably just a kids toy.

[Regolith]

Authorities say the pineapple grenade casing was modified to be an IED.  They say the device was poorly constructed and would have caused minimal damage if it had exploded. There also was no detonator on the device.

This reads to me like someone took an deactivated grenade and tried to reactivate it, and failed miserly.

As they note, it wouldn't have done much even if it hadn't been a dud.

[KD5NRH]

As they note, it wouldn't have done much even if it hadn't been a dud.

It might not have, but those Lite-Brites in Boston didn't do anything at all and look at the resulting mess.

[280plus]

It might not have, but those Lite-Brites in Boston didn't do anything at all and look at the resulting mess.

What a bunch of dumbasses... 

 

[MicroBalrog]

We are now at the point that nothing even needs to explode, catch fire, or be destroyed at all for us to panic and spend thousands of dollars and hundreds of cumulative man-hours on resolving it.

[HankB]

We are now at the point that nothing even needs to explode, catch fire, or be destroyed at all for us to panic and spend thousands of dollars and hundreds of cumulative man-hours on resolving it.

IIRC, some years back the Brits cordoned off an area because someone saw a .22 rimfire round by the curb. (Don't remember if it was live or a spent casing.)

Never built a "bomb" with the intent of harming anyone or doing damage, but some of the stuff I did as a kid with pyrotechnics would probably draw the ire of authorities today. 

[280plus]

Never built a "bomb" with the intent of harming anyone or doing damage, but some of the stuff I did as a kid with pyrotechnics would probably draw the ire of authorities today.  

Ditto...  

Of course, I never did get too exotic with the chemicals. I know if you make a box out of 6 exploding targets with an M80 inside as a detonator and then wrap it real good with duct tape it will clear about a 3' circle of heavy grass, clean down to the dirt. It was awesome.

[French G.]

You mean like the principal of your school discovering you have the Army FM "Improvised Explosives and Munitions" in your locker?  Look, not my fault, my dad strong armed me into model rocketry. First thing he does when the stuff comes is duct tape a spent motor case to a live motor, fill spent case with FFg then launch from 15ft fiberglass antenna mast. Then it was on to duct tape largest motor to old broadhead arrow, lay in angle iron, watch disappear. The lessons on acetylene trashbags, magnesium and potassium chlorate, etc.

Was it any wonder that I was that kid?

[Tallpine]

We are now at the point that nothing even needs to explode, catch fire, or be destroyed at all for us to panic and spend thousands of dollars and hundreds of cumulative man-hours on resolving it.

Stop giving me ideas 

[GigaBuist]

It might not have, but those Lite-Brites in Boston didn't do anything at all and look at the resulting mess.

A few weeks after that they blew up a suspicious device left by the side of the road.

It was a traffic monitoring system installed by the city.

[roo_ster]

A few weeks after that they blew up a suspicious device left by the side of the road.

It was a traffic monitoring system installed by the city.

Is it possible for all the red light and speed cameras to be so misidentified?

[AJ Dual]

So what we've got is one of those cast iron dummy practice grenades. Some doofus welded a disk to cover the flash hole that let the smoke out, and left it on the side of the road.

Do we even know if it had a live charge of some sort inside it or was just a hollow shell, and was blown up "just in case" to give the bomb squad some practice, and sensationalize the news? When I hear "IED" I'm thinking a pile of 155mm howitzer shells wired together with an old Nokia cell phone. Not some replica cast iron WWII pineapple grenade.

And note: The entire Waco/Branch Davidian fiasco was started over one of these dummy hand grenades too.

[Tallpine]

Did it have a red LED clock timer 

If not, it couldn't have been a bomb 

[Hawkmoon]

Prolly one of these

[seeker_two]

We are now at the point that nothing even needs to explode, catch fire, or be destroyed at all for us to panic and spend thousands of dollars and hundreds of cumulative man-hours on resolving it.

...sounds like a great way to protest the overreach of gov't authorities without actually hurting anyone but the donut shops' afternoon business..... 

[Sergeant Bob]

Did it have a red LED clock timer 

If not, it couldn't have been a bomb 

Has to beep too.

[birdman]

Has to beep too.

Don't forget multicolored coiled wires!

[Jim147]

Don't forget multicolored coiled wires!

As long as it doesn't have a blue wire it won't go off.

jim

[seeker_two]

Just yank 'em all....that always works....

[KD5NRH]

Just yank 'em all....that always works....

I just find it amusing that so many of them obviously have only one blasting cap attached, and yet the hero never thinks to just yank that out and pull the wires off of it.

[seeker_two]

I just find it amusing that so many of them obviously have only one blasting cap attached, and yet the hero never thinks to just yank that out and pull the wires off of it.

That's because all the cool bomb-makers use mercury switches....esp. since they're so easy to get....I bought a dozen out at the local Wally World just for special occasions.... 

[roo_ster]

That's because all the cool bomb-makers use mercury switches....esp. since they're so easy to get....I bought a dozen out at the local Wally World just for special occasions.... 

I was wondering to myself the other day, "Hmm, I wonder what I could use as a substitute for a mercury switch?  Perhaps, in a situation where it doesn't have to keep for too long, salt water?"

Salt water with enough salt dissolved in it to make it unfriendly to micro organisms might do the trick, in the right vessel.

[MechAg94]

Police are talking to the driver to try to gather any more information about the device

I noted this little quote from the story.  For some reason I am picturing a good Samaritan who reported the suspicious device and is repaid by being detained and questioned for hours.  

He won't do that again.