Failed car bomb in Times Square

[Ausmerican]

One thing to consider is that the bomb was never meant to go off. As was pointed out it would have probably only caused a fire. The IDEA of a large car bomb in Times Square is far more powerful than the probable explosion may have been. The goal of terrorism is to effect changes in behaviour by the sowing of terror. Sowing is done.

 

[Policenaut]

From the descriptions so far, it doesn't look like this thing would have caused much more than a car fire anyway. Propane tanks can explode, but it's not as easy to make them do it as most of the idiots improvising this stuff seem to think it is. Usually, the safety valve just dumps, which can make a pretty big fire, but no explosion.

Most people probably didn't know that years ago. But thanks to Mythbusters and their love of explosions any nut has the potential to know that disabling the safety valve on a propane tank will cause a devastating explosion with video showing them exactly how deadly it can be.

 

[George 152]

Except I don't think this "car bomb" was likely to cause much more than a fire. There were no actual explosives in the thing.

If you exclude the disruptive effects of the gas/air mix that was present...

 

[Infoexcavator]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/us_times_square_car_bomb

The police think they have videotape of the terrorist, a white male in his 40s.

Many people seem to be hoping that the Militias and Tea Parties have done this, however I dont think there are any major government buildings or abortion clinics in the area.

 

[Skeptic]

One thing to consider is that the bomb was never meant to go off. As was pointed out it would have probably only caused a fire. The IDEA of a large car bomb in Times Square is far more powerful than the probable explosion may have been. The goal of terrorism is to effect changes in behaviour by the sowing of terror. Sowing is done.

Well, yes, but a bomb actually blowing up and killing people in Times Square might be a bit more effective than a "Phew! They missed!" headline.

As Eddie Izzard said, "Guns don't kill people, people kill people -- but the gun helps."

 

[abenja1]

Or, because it's a democracy, we could stay and effect the system in the direction we desire.

Notice you never hear anyone say, "If you don't like abortion being legal, you should just get out of the country."

The neat thing about free societies is that we don't have to agree with whatever the authorities declare is right.

My post was partially in jest. I don't know if you visit the Conspiracy forums, but INRM is well known for posting all kinds of conspiracy diatribe. Anytime a story breaks about a bomb, threat, etc, he always says "this is it. We're going to loose our civil rights." And in the end we never do. My post was a suggestion that if he thinks he's going loose his civil rights (which we clearly will not and are not going to loose because of this bombing) he is welcome to go and live in any other country which he thinks is better.

 

[Ryokan]

Another bomb has been found in Pennsylvania:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/05/02/pittsburgh-marathon-bomb_n_560173.html

 

[TraneWreck]

My post was partially in jest. I don't know if you visit the Conspiracy forums, but INRM is well known for posting all kinds of conspiracy diatribe. Anytime a story breaks about a bomb, threat, etc, he always says "this is it. We're going to loose our civil rights." And in the end we never do. My post was a suggestion that if he thinks he's going loose his civil rights (which we clearly will not and are not going to loose because of this bombing) he is welcome to go and live in any other country which he thinks is better.

Haha, fair enough.

 

[Infoexcavator]

Another bomb has been found in Pennsylvania:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/05/02/pittsburgh-marathon-bomb_n_560173.html

A microwave oven that someone had dumped on the route of the marathon.

From the article:
""At this point, we believe it was not an actual explosive device, but we are still evaluating the microwave and its contents," "

 

[KingMerv00]

A microwave oven that someone had dumped on the route of the marathon.

To be fair, it was set on "high".

 

[INRM]

Instinctively I thought this was going to be used to label tea-baggers as terrorists, but actually the government seems to be using it to remind people to be afraid of them muslim terrorists.

You know people stop being so abjectly terrified of terrorists (to the point that they'll give up all their freedoms to be safe) sometimes, and the government feels it's important to remind people to be afraid (to the point that they'll give up all their freedoms to be safe).

The government knows that nothing motivates people to give up all their most basic freedoms and rights than the raw stink of fear.

 

[abenja1]

Haha, fair enough.

No problemo.

 

[abenja1]

Instinctively I thought this was going to be used to label tea-baggers as terrorists, but actually the government seems to be using it to remind people to be afraid of them muslim terrorists.

You know people stop being so abjectly terrified of terrorists (to the point that they'll give up all their freedoms to be safe) sometimes, and the government feels it's important to remind people to be afraid (to the point that they'll give up all their freedoms to be safe).

The government knows that nothing motivates people to give up all their most basic freedoms and rights than the raw stink of fear.

Whatever you say. I am sure the human rights records of Iran, Saudi Arabia, and Pakistan must be much higher there than here. Why don't you go live in one of those countries instead.

 

[BenBurch]

Whatever you say. I am sure the human rights records of Iran, Saudi Arabia, and Pakistan must be much higher there than here. Why don't you go live in one of those countries instead.

I'll chip in $5 for the ticket.

 

[Juniversal]

Haha, fair enough.

INRM seems to have the chicken little syndrome. "The sky is falling. The sky is falling!!!"

 

[technoextreme]

News meeting over. Some new details and some others clarified. A vendor spotted the possible car fire, let a police officer on horseback know, and then everyone got involved. No one is known to have been seen fleeing from the vehicle. Bloomberg described the device as amateur-looking. It consisted of 3 propane tanks, 2 filled 5 gallon gas tanks, wires, 2 alarm clocks, and fireworks. Also there seemed to be a gun locker-looking metal box in the suv. The plates were from connecticut and do not belong to the vehicle.

Amateur looking???? Its like they built the stuff from the Mythbusters school of stuff that isn't explosive. Seriously, they didn't put any real explosives in the car.

If you exclude the disruptive effects of the gas/air mix that was present...

Huge *********** fire ball != Bomb. I've seen gasoline fires. Not that impressive. As long as the greater public isn't a bunch of freaking idiots then its harmless.

One thing to consider is that the bomb was never meant to go off. As was pointed out it would have probably only caused a fire. The IDEA of a large car bomb in Times Square is far more powerful than the probable explosion may have been. The goal of terrorism is to effect changes in behaviour by the sowing of terror. Sowing is done.

I wonder if this is even true though. I just laughed because the guy who built the device was an abject idiot.

 

[patchbunny]

The fireworks appear to be an inovation though.

Maybe he was hoping they'd form a giant "V" above the explosion.

 

[Policenaut]

Amateur looking???? Its like they built the stuff from the Mythbusters school of stuff that isn't explosive. Seriously, they didn't put any real explosives in the car.

I'm wondering if we haven't seen a sophisticated homemade bomb in the US for a long time because it has become all but impossible to research how to make one (especially on the internet) without alerting the FBI.

 

[technoextreme]

I'm wondering if we haven't seen a sophisticated homemade bomb in the US for a long time because it has become all but impossible to research how to make one (especially on the internet) without alerting the FBI.

No. Because five minutes with a basic machine show and you can actually turn a propane tank into a bomb.

 

[ravdin]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/us_times_square_car_bomb

The police think they have videotape of the terrorist, a white male in his 40s.

Many people seem to be hoping that the Militias and Tea Parties have done this, however I dont think there are any major government buildings or abortion clinics in the area.

We can't rule out al Qaida or the Taliban just by the suspect's ethnicity. They have many sympathizers among white Americans. A couple of recent, high profile examples are Colleen LaRose (aka "Jihad Jane") who was recruited to travel to Sweden to carry out a hit, and Zachary Chesser (aka "Abu Talhah al-Amrikee") who threatened the South Park creators with death for depicting Mohammed.

It's certainly likely as well that this was a lone nut with an axe to grind, but not all the facts are in yet.