Car bomb

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File:Oklahomacitybombing-DF-ST-98-01356.jpg
The result of the 1995 Oklahoma City truck bombing, which destroyed the Alfred P. Murrah building and killed 168 people

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A car bomb, bus bomb, van bomb, lorry bomb, or truck bomb, also known as a vehicle-borne improvised explosive device (VBIED),Template:Sfn is an improvised explosive device designed to be detonated in an automobile or other vehicles.

Car bombs can be roughly divided into two main categories: those used primarily to kill the occupants of the vehicle (often as an assassination) and those used as a means to kill, injure or damage people and buildings outside the vehicle. The latter type may be parked (the vehicle disguising the bomb and allowing the bomber to get away), or the vehicle might be used to deliver the bomb (often as part of a suicide bombing).

It is commonly used as a weapon of terrorism or guerrilla warfare to kill people near the blast site or to damage buildings or other property.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> Car bombs act as their own delivery mechanisms and can carry a relatively large amount of explosives without attracting suspicion. In larger vehicles and trucks, weights of around Template:Convert or more have been used, for example, in the Oklahoma City bombing.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> Car bombs are activated in a variety of ways, including opening the vehicle's doors, starting the engine, remote detonation, depressing the accelerator or brake pedals, or simply lighting a fuse or setting a timing device.<ref name="technology"/> The gasoline in the vehicle's fuel tank may make the explosion of the bomb more powerful by dispersing and igniting the fuel.

History

Template:Further Template:See also Car bombs have been used for attacks motivated by a wide variety of grievances and ideologies, by people and groups from a wide variety of cultural and religious backgrounds: left wing, right wing, Jewish, Catholic, Shia, Sunni, and others.<ref name="Davis The First Car Bomb"/><ref name="talks with IRA"/><ref name="Inquest Winchester"/>Template:Additional citation needed

Car bombs are preceded by the 16th century hellburners, explosive-laden ships which were used to deadly effect by the besieged Dutch forces in Antwerp against the besieging Spanish. Though using a less refined technology, the basic principle of the hellburner is similar to that of the car bomb.Template:According to whom

The first car bomb may have been the one used for the assassination attempt on Ottoman Sultan Abdul Hamid II in 1905 in Istanbul by Armenian separatists in the command of Papken Siuni belonging to the Armenian Revolutionary Federation.Template:According to whom

Car bombs were also preceded by animal bombs using horses and cows, then eventually emerging into car use.<ref name="Davis The First Car Bomb"/> Prior to the 20th century, bombs planted in horse carts had been used in assassination plots, notably the unsuccessful "machine infernale" attempt to kill Napoleon on 24 December 1800.Template:According to whom Mario Buda's improvised wagon used in the 1920 Wall Street bombing is considered a prototype of the car bomb.<ref name="Davis The First Car Bomb"/>

The first reported car bombing was the Bath School bombings in Michigan, USA in 1927. Multiple separate explosions on the same day killed 45 people, including the bomber, and half of a school was destroyed.Template:According to whom The bombings were all carried out by Andrew Kehoe, motivated by a personal grievance. His death was possibly an intentional suicide, but the cause of the explosion was a gun shot that might not have been intended to set off the load. The explosion itself did not seem to form part of a suicide attack on a specific planned target other than possibly himself and his truck. The explosives in his truck detonated when he saw two men nearby had a gun, after he set off multiple other bombs.<ref name="Inquest Page 326"/><ref name="Inquest Page 352"/> The explosion may have been set off indirectly by him firing his own gun at the men.<ref name="Inquest Winchester"/><ref name="Jones PhD Dissertation Page 1"/> Most of the deaths were caused by the earlier bombs.<ref name="ellsworth ch 2"/><ref name="Burcar"/>

Some groups in Palestine have used both cars and donkeysTemplate:Broken anchor.<ref name="972 donkey"/><ref name="MEMO 1937"/><ref name="Donkey human shield"/> The Irgun, a Zionist militant group in British controlled Palestine, abused donkeys as suicide bombers in two attacks on Haifa vegetable market in 1939. They used unwitting donkeys loaded with explosives to attack the market, one attack killed 78 people, the other killed 21 people and wounded 24.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref><ref>Template:Cite news</ref> The previous year the Irgun attacked the market with a car bomb, killing 35 Arab civilians and wounding 70.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> There are no clearly documented cases of the Irgun using car bombs in suicide attacks, but the Irgun and their extremist Lehi splinter group used suicide in other circumstances and are seen as the key developers of car bombs, that were later used by other groups in numerous suicide attacks.<ref name="Davis The First Car Bomb"/> The Irgun were extremely influential.Template:Citation needed

While not an adaptation of a people-carrying vehicle, the WW2 German Goliath remote control mine shares many parallels with a vehicle-based IED. It approached a target (often a tank or another armoured vehicle) at speed before exploding, destroying itself and the target. It was armoured so that it could not be destroyed en route. However, it was not driven by a person, instead operated by remote control from a safe distance.Template:Sfn

The first non-suicide car bombing "fully conceptualized as a weapon of urban warfare" came on 12 January 1947 when the Lehi (also known as Stern Gang), a Zionist paramilitary organization, bombed the Haifa police station.<ref name="Davis The First Car Bomb"/> On 4 January 1948, a Lehi car bomb in Jaffa killed 70 Palestinian Arabs.<ref name="Haaretz Dare Compare"/>

Car bombing was a significant part of the Provisional Irish Republican Army (PIRA) campaign during The Troubles in Northern Ireland. Dáithí Ó Conaill is credited with introducing the car bomb to Northern Ireland.<ref name="talks with IRA"/> Car bombs were also used by Ulster loyalist groups (for example, by the UVF during the Dublin and Monaghan bombings).<ref name="Lewiston"/><ref name="CAIN1969"/><ref name="CAIN1974"/><ref name="comeheretome"/> PIRA Chief of Staff Seán Mac Stíofáin defines the car bomb as both a tactical and a strategic guerrilla warfare weapon. Strategically, it disrupts the ability of the enemy government to administer the country, and hits simultaneously at the core of its economic structure by means of massive destruction. From a tactical point of view, it ties down a large number of security forces and troops around the main urban areas of the region in conflict.<ref name="Revolutionary in Ireland"/>

A notable suicide car bombing was the 1983 Beirut barracks bombing, when two simultaneous attacks killed 241 U.S. and 58 French peacekeepers. The perpetrator of these attacks has never been positively confirmed. In the Lebanese Civil War, an estimated 3,641 car bombs were detonated.<ref name="Atlas Group and Walid Raad"/> The tactic was adopted by Palestinian militant groups such as the Qassam Brigades (militant wing of Hamas), Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades (militant wing of Fatah,Template:Efn and Saraya al-Quds (militant wing of Palestinian Islamic Jihad).<ref name="Jewish Virtual Library - Comprehensive Listing"/><ref name="Jewish Virtual Library - Since Oslo"/>Template:Better source needed especially during the Second Intifada (2000–2005).<ref name="Brief History"/><ref name="Dreams Deferred"/><ref name="Toledo Blade"/>

Mass-casualty suicide car bombings are predominantly associatedTemplate:Who with the Middle East, particularly in recent decades.Template:According to whomTemplate:Cn

In the autumn of 2005, there were 140 car bombings happening per month.<ref name="Davis The First Car Bomb"/>Template:Verify source

As a delivery system

File:Iraq carbomb.jpg
Car bomb in Iraq, made up of a number of artillery shells concealed in the back of a pickup truck.

Car bombs are effective weapons as they are an easy way to transport a large number of explosives to a target. A car bomb also produces copious shrapnel, or flying debris, and secondary damage to bystanders and buildings. In recent years, car bombs have become widely used by suicide bombers.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref><ref>Template:Cite news</ref><ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

Countermeasures

Defending against a car bomb involves keeping vehicles at a distance from vulnerable targets by using roadblocks and checkpoints, Jersey barriers, concrete blocks or bollards, metal barriers, or by hardening buildings to withstand explosions. The entrance to Downing Street in London has been closed since 1991 in reaction to the Provisional Irish Republican Army campaign, preventing the public from approaching Number 10. Where major public roads pass near buildings, road closures may be the only option (thus, for instance, in Washington, D.C. the portion of Pennsylvania Avenue immediately in front of the White House is closed to traffic). Historically these tactics have encouraged potential bombers to target "soft" or unprotected targets, such as markets.<ref>See Davis.Template:Full citation needed</ref>

Suicide usage

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In the Iraqi and Syrian Civil War, the car bomb concept was modified so that it could be driven and detonated by a driver but armoured to withstand incoming fire. The vehicle would be driven to its target area, in a similar fashion to a kamikaze plane of WW2.Template:Sfn These were known by the acronym SVBIED (from Suicide Vehicle Borne Improvised Explosive Device) or VBIEDs. Ordinary civilian cars were outfitted with armour plating intended to protect the VBIED as it approached its target.Template:Sfn Such SVBIEDs were driven into enemy troop areas or incoming enemy columns.Template:Sfn Most often, the SVBIEDs were used by ISIL against Government forces, but also used by Syrian rebels (FSA and allied militias, especially the Al-Nusra Front) against government troops.Template:Sfn

The vehicles have become more sophisticated, with armour plating on the vehicle, protected vision slits, armour plating over the wheels so they would withstand being shot at and occasionally additional metal grating over the front of the vehicle designed to crush or destroy incoming shaped charges such as those used on rocket propelled grenades.<ref>Trends Institution "Daeshis-armored-vehicle-borne IED" {{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

File:USMC-100727-M-6126D-003.jpg
A mock explosion of a pickup truck converted to SVBIED, used by U.S. marines for OPFOR purposes at Camp Pendleton.

Trucks were sometimes used to start an assault, and benefitted from their greater storage space that could contain very heavy explosives.Template:Sfn Animal drawn carts, typically pulled by horse or mule, have also been used.Template:Sfn<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> Tactically, a single vehicle may be used, or an initial "breakthrough" vehicle, then followed by another vehicle.Template:Sfn

While many car bombs are disguised as ordinary vehicles,<ref>Template:Cite book p.166</ref> some that are used against military forces have improvised vehicle armour attached to prevent the driver from being shot when attacking a fortified outpost.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

Operation

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File:061509 story4.jpg
TSA officers view the post-blast remains of a Dodge Neon after an explosive was detonated inside it during training.

Car bombs and detonators function in a diverse manner of ways and there are numerous variables in the operation and placement of the bomb within the vehicle. Earlier and less advanced car bombs were often wired to the car's ignition system, but this practice is now considered more laborious and less effective than other more recent methods, as it requires a greater amount of work for a system that can often be quite easily defused. While it is more common nowadays for car bombs to be fixed magnetically to the underside of the car, underneath the passenger or driver's seat, or inside of the mudguard, detonators triggered by the opening of the vehicle door or by pressure applied to the brakes or accelerating pedals are also used.<ref name="technology"/>

Bombs operating by the former method of fixation to the underside of the car more often than not make use of a device called a tilt fuse. A small tube made of glass or plastic, the tilt fuse is similar in operation to a mercury switch or medical tablet tube. One end of the fuse will be filled with mercury, while the other open end is wired with the ends of an open circuit to an electrical firing system. When the tilt fuse moves or is jerked, the supply of mercury will flow to the top of the tube and close the circuit. Thus, as the vehicle goes through the regular bumping and dipping that comes with driving over a terrain, the circuit is completed, and the explosive is detonated.<ref name="technology"/>

Car bombs are effective as booby traps because they also leave very little evidence. When an explosion happens, it is difficult for forensics to find any evidence because things either denigrate or become charred.<ref name="Davis The First Car Bomb"/>

As a safety mechanism to protect the bomber, the placer of the bomb may rig a timing device incorporated with the circuit to activate the circuit only after a certain time period, therefore ensuring the bomber will not accidentally activate the bomb before they are able to get clear of the blast radius.<ref name="technology"/>

Groups that use car bombs

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Americas

Europe

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West Asia

File:Car bomb in Iraq.jpg
A 2005 car bombing in Iraq, in which a second car bomb was detonated while US forces were investigating the scene of an earlier such blast, resulting in 18 casualties.
  • The Iraqi insurgency. An estimated 578 car bombs were detonated in Iraq between June 2003 and June 2006.
  • The Islamic State, which has employed armored explosive-laden crossovers, full-sized pickup trucks, and SUVs as suicidal tactical units to breach enemy defensive fronts in Syria and Iraq. The use of armored tractors and haul trucks was also recorded over the course of the war.

South Asia

  • Militants and criminals in India occasionally utilize car bombs in attacks. This includes Muslim, Sikh, Kashmiri and Naxalite militants, as well as rival politicians within the government and organized crime. A notable recent attack was the 25 August 2003 Mumbai bombings, in which two car bombs killed 54 people. The attack was claimed by the Pakistani-backed Kashmiri separatist group Lashkar-e-Taiba.
  • The Pakistani Taliban have occasionally used car bombs in their ongoing conflict with the government of Pakistan.

Timeline

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20th century

File:Scene of Viet Cong terrorist bombing in Saigon, Republic of Vietnam., 1965.jpg
Vietcong car bombing aftermath scene in Saigon, 1965.

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  • Constable Angela Taylor died on her way to collect lunch, the sole fatality of the Russell Street bombing in Melbourne, Australia on 27 March 1986. 22 others were injured.
  • On 23 November 1986, two members of the Armenian Revolutionary Federation carried out the Melbourne Turkish consulate bombing using a car bomb, which resulted in the death of one of the attackers.
  • Suicide car bombs were a regular feature against Israel in the 1982 Lebanon War which lasted from 1982 until Israel's withdrawal in 2000. The bombing campaign was waged by several groups, most prominently Hezbollah.
  • In the 1980s, the Colombian drug lord Pablo Escobar used vehicle bombs extensively against government forces and population centers in Colombia and Latin America. The most notable car bombing attack was the 1989 DAS Building bombing, which killed 63 and injured about 1,000. Also, on July 4, 1989, a car bomb killed governor of Antioquia Antonio Roldán Betancur and five others; a prominent member of Escobar's Medellin Cartel later confessed to the crime.
  • During the Soviet–Afghan War of the 1980s, at a variety of training camps in the tribal areas of Pakistan,<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> the Pakistani Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), with the aid of the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), trained mujahideen in the preparation of car bombs. Car bombs became a regular occurrence during the war, the Afghan civil conflicts which followed, and then during the U.S. invasion of Afghanistan from 2001 and the war in Afghanistan ending in 2021.
  • On 26 February 1993, (World Trade Center bombing) Islamist terrorists led by Ramzi Yousef detonated a Ryder van filled with explosives in the parking garage of the World Trade Center in New York City. Yousef's plan had been to cause one of the towers to collapse into the other, destroying both and killing thousands of people. Although this was not achieved, six people were killed, 1,042 others injured, and extensive damage was caused.
  • On 18 April 1993, a tanker containing 500 kilograms of explosives exploded near the mosque in Vitez, destroying the offices of the Bosnian War Presidency, killing at least six people and injuring 50 others. The ICTY accepted that this action was a piece of pure terrorism committed by elements within the Croat forces, as an attack on the Bosniak population of Stari Vitez - Vitez old town. HVO members tied a Bosniak male civilian from a concentration camp to the steering wheel and set the truck in motion towards the old town.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation

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21st century

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  • In 2013, Afghan security forces intercepted a truck bomb deployed by the Haqqanis. It was the largest truck bomb ever built, with some 61,500 lbs of explosives.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation

|CitationClass=web }}</ref><ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> It was ultimately defused. The bomb was over 10 times the size of the car bomb used on the Murrah Building in Oklahoma City. While the bomb was not detonated, it caused security changes throughout the region and the closure of the US Army base FOB Goode near Gardez.<ref>Template:Cite conference</ref>

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  • On 18 June 2023, the Russian Army was documented as using a T-55 tank filled with approximately 6 tons of high explosives against entrenched Ukrainian Forces near Marinka, Donetsk Oblast with the intent of clearing the trenches.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation

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  • On 10 September 2023, it was reported that Ukraine's 128th Mountain Assault Brigade converted a captured T-62 tank into a VBIED filled with 1.5 tons of explosives and drove it against Russian positions in the Zaporizhzhia region. The tank hit a mine and exploded before it could reach the enemy positions.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref><ref>Template:Cite news</ref>
  • On 13 July 2024, Thomas Matthew Crooks attempted to assassinate Donald Trump, the former president of the United States, at a campaign rally near Butler, Pennsylvania. Crooks attempt was unsuccessful and he was killed in the process. Following his death, investigators found explosive devices in the trunk of his car, suggesting he planned to set off an explosion remotely as a possible distraction.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>
  • On January 1, 2025, at approximately 8:39 a.m. PST, a Tesla Cybertruck exploded outside the main entrance of the Trump International Hotel in Las Vegas. The driver, identified as 37-year-old U.S. Army Special Forces Sergeant Matthew Alan Livelsberger from Colorado Springs, Colorado, died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound just before the explosion. Seven bystanders sustained minor injuries from the blast.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation

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  • On May 17, 2025, at approximately 10:52 a.m. PDT, a silver 2010 Ford Fusion sedan loaded with explosives detonated outside the American Reproductive Centers fertility clinic in Palm Springs, California, resulting in the death of the perpetrator and injuries to four others.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation

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  • On November 10, 2025, at approximately 6:52 p.m. a car Hyundai i20 exploded near the Red Fort Metro Station in Delhi, India, killing at least thirteen people and more than 20 people were injured.

See also

Citations

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Notes

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Sources

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