You’re probably all aware that on Saturday, an attempted car bomb was found in New York City’s Times Square. Authorities have released more information about the attempt:
Raymond W. Kelly, the New York City police commissioner, said on Sunday that the materials found in the Nissan Pathfinder — gasoline, propane, firecrackers and simple alarm clocks — also included eight bags of a granular substance, later determined to be nonexplosive grade of fertilizer, inside a 55-inch-tall metal gun locker.
The bomb, Mr. Kelly said, “would have caused casualties, a significant fireball.”
The Taliban in Pakistan tried to take credit for the attempt but authorities say they see no links to them. The suspect caught on surveillance footage (see video at the link) is a white man in his 40s.
Investigators were reviewing surveillance footage that showed an unidentified man walking away from West 45th Street, where the Nissan Pathfinder had been parked. The police said the man was a “person of interest.” The man was seen in Shubert Alley, which runs between 44th and 45th Streets, looking furtively over his shoulder and removing a dark shirt, revealing a red one underneath, officials said. The man then stuffed the dark shirt into a bag, officials said.
In the case of this terrorism attempt, the system worked. The car bomb was first noticed by street vendors (who saw smoke coming out of the car) and notified police. There was also a significant amount of fertilizer in the car, but it was the non-explosive kind. There was so much fertilizer, that it may have taken multiple persons to load it into the car.
Investigators believed that the fuses on the firecrackers had been lighted, but they did not explode, officials said. The burning fuses apparently ignited a portion of the Pathfinder’s interior, causing a small fire that filled the inside with smoke, one law enforcement official said.
Because the bomb didn’t actually go off, it sounds like investigators have a lot to go on. They’ve already traced the car’s license plates to a repair shop and the other materials came from hardware stores.
I find this attempt to be rather scary, myself. In my mind it means terrorists are moving to smaller, easier targets instead of large mass-casualty attacks. These tactics are much more likely to be effective, IMO, and much harder to stop. Are we seeing a new type of al Qaeda menace (authorities have said there’s similarities with attempts in London and Glasgow linked to Iraq) or is this a rightwing domestic terrorist threat? Hopefully there was enough evidence left behind to catch the people responsible for this attempt.