ANALYSIS:The Slovak authorities risked many Irish lives in their secret airport exercise which failed to detect high explosives
THE EXPLOSIVES seized by gardaí at an apartment on Dorset Street, Dublin, on Tuesday consisted of a quantity of RDX (Research Department Explosives) – a fact confirmed later that day by a Defence Forces spokesman who described the material as “a powerful high-grade plastic explosive”. Interestingly, it was also confirmed that the material was not Semtex – a highly stable plastic explosive previously manufactured in the former Czechoslovakia and commonly used by the Provisional IRA during the Troubles.
RDX was originally invented by the British during the second World War and is still used in many commercial and military explosive applications worldwide.
RDX is also used by terrorist organisations. Significantly, less than 200 grammes of RDX, was used by two female Chechen suicide bombers in August of 2004 to destroy two Russian passenger aircraft – a Volga Avia Express and a Siberian Airlines flight – shortly after they departed Moscow’s Domodedovo airport. RDX is therefore a high explosive associated with terrorist attacks on civil aviation.
This may have been one of the reasons the Slovak authorities used RDX in their so-called “security test” at Poprad-Tatry airport last Saturday.
However, there can be no rationale for the fact that the RDX was allowed to proceed into the baggage hold of the Dublin-bound Danube Wings aircraft on Saturday.
Nor can there be any justification for allowing the explosive material to be taken into Irish airspace onboard a civilian passenger aircraft.
A senior ordnance expert who spoke at length yesterday stated that RDX explosive products intended for either military or commercial use within Europe come with a Manufacturers Safety Data Sheet or MSDS.
European-use MSDSs for RDX explosives advise that the explosives are considered safe for use or storage only between minus five and plus 30 degrees . Outside of these temperature ranges, RDX is considered unstable and potentially dangerous.
That is another way of saying that it is more likely to ignite without the requirement for a detonator.
For specialist use of RDX, such as in the Arctic or in hotter, desert conditions, RDX products are custom plasticised to maintain their stability outside of the aforementioned standard temperature ranges.
Because of their inherent instability, plastic explosives therefore are not normally carried by air and are usually shipped by surface transport under strict licence and health and safety protocols.
Even the military, who occasionally transport RDX by air, never mix passengers with high explosives.
It beggars belief that Saturday’s Danube Wings passenger flight was allowed to proceed into Irish airspace with high explosives – of a quantity sufficient to destroy an aircraft in flight – stored in its cargo hold.
Luckily for all concerned, the Dublin-bound flight arrived in Ireland without having encountered severe turbulence or any other in-flight incidents. However, the RDX was cleared through Dublin airport. It was then carried unsuspectingly all the way to an apartment complex on Dorset Street, in Dublin’s inner city.
At this point, the RDX was being stored in an uncontrolled environment with possibly lethal consequences.
Given the cold weather currently being experienced in Dublin – with temperatures dipping below minus five degrees at night – had the RDX been placed outside in the boot of a car, or discarded in a wheelie-bin, there was a real risk, however remote, of the explosive material becoming crystallised and unstable. In this state, a detonator would not have been required to trigger the explosives.
Furthermore, had the RDX been tipped into a refuse truck, given the mechanical crushing involved – stable or unstable – the explosives could easily have detonated, giving rise to casualties.
In this respect, the explosive qualities of RDX make for sobering reading. The shock wave generated by RDX on detonation – even in quantities as small as 90 grammes – travels at a speed of between 2,000 and 4,000 metres per second.
Such a shock wave would inflict gross blunt trauma or limb separation on anyone in the immediate vicinity of such a blast.
Such a shock wave would also pulp the internal organs of anyone within close proximity to the blast.
If detonated within a vehicle, or a refuse truck, there would have been a shrapnel effect impacting on passersby or people in nearby buildings.
In effect, had the RDX detonated – without the requirement for a detonator – by way of impact, electrical impulse, heat or crushing within a vehicle of any description, it would have functioned as a de-facto car bomb.
Had the RDX been detonated within an apartment complex, plasterboard studding, insulation panels and concrete walls would have contained the blast magnifying its explosive impact.
With the temperature of RDX rising to over 2,000 degrees on detonation, there would also have been a fire within the apartment complex.
Stored in an uncontrolled environment, by people unaware of its explosive qualities, RDX is potentially highly unstable and dangerous.
Exposure to direct sunlight, impact, static charge or even extremes of heat or cold can render it highly explosive in such circumstances.
The reaction of the Irish authorities to this incident seems somewhat muted.
A smaller amount – 80 grammes – of PETN transported into US airspace, on Christmas Day caused President Barack Obama to break his Christmas holidays in Hawaii to address the US public on the matter.
He cited a lack of communication between security agencies as a central issue of concern to the US administration in terms of the security of the US and its citizens.
In our case, with Irish citizens seemingly put so clearly in harm’s way by a “friendly” government, the relative silence on the issue by the Irish authorities is puzzling, to say the least.
Tom Clonan is the Irish TimesSecurity Analyst. He is a retired Army officer who specialised in artillery and explosives during his career with the Irish Defence Forces