Standing Well Back

1930-1940

Sharp Knives on 40ft poles and tubs of water – IED response in the 1930s

I came across this edition of “Popular Mechanics” from July 1932 with a couple of interesting IED related articles – the first is the invention of a postal x-ray machine for IED detection, and then a longer article on IEDs including some postal IEDs that killed an amateur bomb tech, working with a sharp knife on the end of a 40 ft pole.  Also detailed is an IED that was placed in a tub of water in Milwaukee police headquarters – it detonated, killing 14 policemen.  On page 110 there’s also interesting reference to biometrics on IEDs, and the exploitation of evidence from them.

The article also makes reference to the famous New York Bomb Disposal expert Owen Eagen who died of natural causes in 1920 after a career where he is said to have dealt with over 7000 IEDs – a good indicator that New York was once a hotbed of anarchists and criminals who very often resorted to IEDs. I’m currently researching Eagen’s efforts as an early bomb tech and will blog on this in the future. Suffice for now to say there were more than 125 IED incidents in New York between January and October 1913.

EOD Psychology

EOD Operators are lazy

EOD Psychology – A technique for forcing System 2 thinking in EOD operations

In previous posts I have discussed some thought on EOD Psychology inspired by Daniel Kahnemann’s book “Thinking Fast and Slow” where the concepts of “System 1 and System 2 thinking are explored. In very simple terms an EOD operator should utilize “System 1” automatic thinking (by the use of drills) to enable speed within a framework of good principles.  However when something goes wrong or when the unexpected happens or appears, EOD operators must switch to “system 2 “careful analytical thought. The challenge is that some EOD operators (probably most) struggle with this change.  In some cases there is strong evidence to suggest, I believe, that system 2 is not engaged and an operator fools himself into thinking he has carefully thought through the issues, and is free from psychological biases when he is not. It’s then that people die.

Links to previous posts for any reader who wishes to see my earlier posts are here

http://www.standingwellback.com/home/2009/7/28/bomb-technician-training-and-psychology.html

http://www.standingwellback.com/home/2009/8/5/testing-intuition.html

http://www.standingwellback.com/home/2011/10/9/why-do-bomb-techs-do-stupid-things.html

http://www.standingwellback.com/home/2011/10/11/why-do-bomb-techs-do-stupid-things-part-two.html

http://www.standingwellback.com/home/2011/10/24/bomb-technicians-and-psychology.html

http://www.standingwellback.com/home/2011/11/1/eod-operators-are-not-rational.html

http://www.standingwellback.com/home/2011/11/3/eod-psychology-playing-doctors-and-nurses.html

http://www.standingwellback.com/home/2011/11/4/things-you-cant-do-in-a-bomb-suit.html

To this I’m feeding in concepts of narrative psychology where humans look to fit unknowns into a narrative, and the dangers of that in that we look to fit information into an existing simple narrative rather than develop a new complex narrative.  I’m now also drawing on a CIA publication ‘The Psychology of Intelligence Analysis’ by Richard J Heuer, Jr. available here under “1999”.

https://www.cia.gov/library/center-for-the-study-of-intelligence/csi-publications/books-and-monographs/

Although this latter reference is the understanding of psychology with regard to intelligence matters, I think there is an excellent “read across” to the EOD world.

In particular Part III of this latter reference examines cognitive biases where errors in analytical thought are caused by simple strategies.  I recommend a wade through this document. In fact if I had a chance I’d make a read of it mandatory for EOD operators.

One point it makes is that we perceive what we expect to perceive, and we look for indicators to reinforce our pre-conceptions rather than focus on indicators which suggest alternate explanations.  This is fundamentally true in EOD threat assessments as well as intelligence analysis.  It is this element that I’m currently focusing on. This research has allowed me now to begin to develop some suggested mental tools for EOD operators and I’d like to humbly present the first one now.

This first tool is one that increases “self awareness” in a situation where System 2 thinking might be demanded.  I am calling the tool the PRE-MORTEM.  The tool attempts to force, indeed “shock” the brain into considering other threats and forces the individual to consider issues that he has ruled out during his Threat Assessment. Here it is:

On any EOD operation where time allows, after the operator has conducted his threat assessment, he should spend a few short minutes developing an imaginary report. To do this he must imagine he is his immediate superior, writing a report to his fellow operators describing the mistakes the operator made that killed him on this very operation.  He can do this by filling in a quick form, which is easily developed, or if time precludes by giving it verbally to his team members in the CP/ICP.  The report should focus on errors in judgment that the operator made and the specifics of the threat he hitherto ignored which resulted in his death. Such activity forces the operator to imagine circumstances that his biases have potentially already set aside or discounted. It may be somewhat morbid but the morbidity can shock the operator into switching from System 1 to System 2 careful, analysis. Remember that the human brain and by corollary the EOD operators brain is lazy and needs encouraging to spend the effort of switching to system 2.

I appreciate that on some operations the tempo of the task does not allow for time to do this – but I certainly think time should be found if something unexpected has occurred. I’d be interested in any feedback on this technique.  I have cooking some other mental tools which might be useful to throw into EOD training and I’ll return to those in the future.

Command IED

Early history of command wire electrically initiated IEDs

In some of my previous blogs I wrote about the first command wire IEDs occurring in the US Civil War, then had to correct myself as I found earlier examples in the Crimean war and then again earlier incidences by both Immanuel Nobel and Samuel Colt.

Well, I keep finding other perhaps earlier references as I dig into this and follow this “historical alley” and it’s really quite interesting and clearly things go back further in time than I had appreciated.  Here’s some extracts from what I’ve been digging up.

It starts with some further exploration into the efforts of Samuel Colt, the American industrialist and arms inventor. Separate from his efforts developing small arms, Colt for many years attempted to get the US government interested in a system for defending the US coastline which he referred to as his “Submarine Battery” which were essentially water-borne command initiated sea mines.  I attempted to try and find the inspiration for Colt’s efforts and the science on which he based his submarine munition technology.

I have in earlier blogs discussed the parallel work of Immanuel Nobel (father of Alfred Nobel) who developed command initiated sea mines for the Russian Navy at about the same time. It would appear that another 19th century military industrialist, this time the German Werner von Siemens was also developing very similar technologies perhaps a few years later in 1848, compared to Colt and Nobel who worked on their versions in the early part of the same decade. What is unclear is if these three entrepreneurial military technology developers were aware of each other’s developments.  Siemens’s devices were used to protect Kiel from Danish naval attacks in 1848.

But pertinent to the subject of electrical initiation of IEDs is a letter written by Benjamin Franklin in 1751 to Mr Peter Collinson of the Royal Academy in England which states

I have not hear’d, that any of your European Electricians have hitherto been able to fire gunpowder by the Electric Flame. We do it here in this Manner.

A small Cartridge is filled with Dry powder, hard rammed, so as to bruise some of the Grains. Two pointed Wires are then thrust In, one at Each End, the points approaching each other in the Middle of the Cartridge, till within the distance of  half an Inch: Then the Cartridge being placed in the Circle (circuit), when the Four Jars (galvanic cells) are discharged the electric Flame leaping from the point of one Wire to the point of the other, within the Cartridge, among the powder, fires It, and the explosion of the powder is at the same Instant with the crack of the Discharge

I wonder if we can call this the first electrically initiated IED? Albeit manufactured with pure science in mind rather than as a weapon.

Inspired directly by Franklin, the Italian Allessandro Volta wrote to a colleague in 1777 describing how he had fired muskets, pistols and an under-water mine by means of his electrical piles. I suspect this was the first electrically initiated IED actually intended as a weapon.

Volta’s Italian compatriot, working on a telegraph, Tiberius Cavallo then took a step further in 1782 in the following manner

The attempts recently made to convey intelligence from one place to another at a great distance, with the utmost quickness, have induced me to publish the following experiments, which I made some years ago. The object for which those experiments were performed, was to fire gun-powder, or other combustible matter, from a great distance, by means of electricity. At first I made a circuit with a very long brass wire, the two ends of which returned to the same place, whilst the middle of the wire stood at a great distance. In this middle an interruption was made, in which a cartridge of gunpowder mixed with steel filings was placed. Then, by applying a charged Leyden phial to the two extremities of the wire, (viz. by touching one wire with the knob of the phial, whilst the other was connected with the outside coating) the cartridge was fired. In this manner I could fire gunpowder from the distance of three hundred feet and upwards.

I think this may effectively be the first command wire initiated IED.

The next issue to be dealt with was waterproofing electrical cable and a variety of attempts were made using a range of substances including india rubber, varnish and tarred hemp. The Russians appear on the scene. Baron Schilling Von Canstadt was a Russian diplomat in Bavaria who took great interest in scientific developments. On his return to St Petersburg in 1812 and driven by war with France, Schilling Von Canstadt developed electrically initiated charges that could be fired across a river, the cable running through the water, with a carbon arc initiator. These were demonstrated in 1812 but do not appear to have been adopted by the Russian Army. Later after the Russians entered Paris after Napoleon’s defeat he undertook a number of similar experiments crossing the Seine.   Here’s a description of him demonstrating a command wire IED to Tsar Alexander I

Once Baron Schilling had the honor to present a wire to the Emperor in his tent. He begged his Majesty to touch it with another wire, whilst looking through the door of the tent in the direction of a very far distant mine. A cloud of smoke rose from this exploding mine at the moment the Emperor, with his hands, made the contact. This caused great surprise, and provoked expressions of satisfaction and applause.

His successor, Tsar Nicholas I was fortunate to escape serious injury in 1837 when an electrically initiated charge was used on a demonstration to destroy a bridge but the demonstration went wrong and the charge detonated prematurely or with larger effect than expected.

The next on the scene were the British. Colonel Pasley of the Royal Engineers was inspired by a newspaper report of the accident in Russia and working with the electrical scientist Wheatstone developed insulated cables and platinum filament exploding detonators around 1839.

Also in the 1830s, American scientist Robert Hare developed “galvanic techniques” for quarry blasting.

Enough for now – some time in the future I’ll return to Colt’s submarine battery, but will state here that as a 15 year old boy in 1829 it appears he had his first success in initiating an explosive charge under water.

Non EOD interesting stuff

Time for some amateur bomb damage assessment.

Further to the recent theme, this is pretty interesting – a link to before and after photos of the explosion at the Iranian facility last week

Click on the buttons at the top of the picture in the link to tranistion from before to after. Pretty intersting stuff – no sign of a single catastrophic explosion but lots of damage and destruction of whole buildings – but not others and I thinks some bulldozing of some of the buioldings after the event. Comments from the rest of you amateur  BDA guys out there welcome :- )

I’m not sure what to think – other than its damned interesting.

1880-1890

The Tsar and the suicide bomber

I have been promising for some time a blog post about the 1881 assassination of the Tsar by suicide bomber in St Petersburg, the site of which I visited a few month ago.  I think that this incident is particularly interesting for the following reasons:

  1. It was a suicide bombing by any definition and thus invites comparisons with modern suicide terrorism
  2. It seems to have sparked and inspired the revolutionaries of the time, demonstrating what was possible – for the next 25 years revolutionaries around the world sought to repeat the impact of the incident
  3. The design was enabled by the development of dynamite in the late 1860s and it would appear by Russian military experience of fusing from the sea mines I discussed last week

The late 1870s and early 1880s were politically a time of great drama. In Russia Anarchists and Nihilists were active and some sought the use of violence to achieve their goals in the light of poor harvests and industrial recession.  The Nihilists objected to the status quo of the ruling class and the capitalist control of the economy and in that at least there are some very modern echoes. One particular group, the Narodnaya Volya (The People’s Will) decided to target the Tsar.  One of this group’s early attempts to assassinate the Tsar was in Moscow in 1879  – the terrorists dug a tunnel from a house and planted three large command initiated IEDs under the railway on a track (by digging a tunnel under a road from a nearby house) that the Tsar was predicted to use. The attack failed as did an attempt a year later when explosives were planted in the Winter Palace in St Petersburg by an employee Stephan Khalturin who was able smuggle the explosives in bit by bit. The picture below shoes the aftermath.

 

I can’t find details of the construct of this device but I believe it was a timed IED. The Tsar delayed a reception dinner thus missing the explosion, but many people were killed or badly wounded in the incident. Amongst the dead were all the members of the Finnish Guard in a room below the intended victims.

In an early example of an “attack the Network” C-IED effort the Russian secret police, the Okrhana, was established in the light of the failed bomb attacks (along with the rise of left wing revolutionary groups) and they were the archetypal “secret police”, running double agents, agents provocateurs, surveillance and interception of communications. They also operated internationally.

On the 13 March the Tsar once again overruled the advice of his security staff and took his carriage on a well known and predictable route through St Petersburg from Michaelovsky Palace to the Winter Palace. Once again this is a story of terrorists exploiting the known and predictable routes of their target. An armed Cossack sat with the coach-driver and another six Cossacks followed on horseback. Behind them came a group of police officers in sledges.

All along the route he was watched by members of Narodnaya Volya, who had carefully planned a triple IED attack. On a street corner near the Catherine Canal a woman terrorist gave the signal to two of the conspirators to throw their bombs at the Tsar’s carriage. The bombs missed the carriage and instead landed amongst the Cossacks. The Tsar was unhurt but insisted on getting out of the carriage to check the condition of the injured men. While he was standing with the wounded Cossacks another terrorist, Elnikoff, stepped forward with a shout and threw his bomb on the ground between himself and the Tsar.

Alexander was mortally wounded and the explosion was so great that Elnikoff also died from the bomb blast.  The device used is quite interesting – he is a contemporary description and an image.

 

 The infernal machine used by Elnikoff was about 7 1/2, inches in height. Metal tubes (bb) filled with chlorate of potash, and enclosing glass tubes (cc) filled with sulphuric acid (commonly called oil of vitriol), intersect the cylinder. Around the glass tubes are rings of iron (dd) closely attached as weights. The construction is such that, no matter how the bomb falls, one of the glass tubes is sure to break. The chlorate of potash in that case, combining with the sulphuric acid, ignites at once, and the flames communicate over the fuse (ff) with the piston (c), filled with fulminate of silver. The concussion thus caused explodes the dynamite or “black jelly” (a) with which the cylinder is closely packed.

You will note some similarities, in principle, with parts of the initiating system from the Russian sea mines of the Crimean war that I posted last week.

In all, I think that this terrorist attack is one of the most significant in history – the first “suicide bombing” to gain international attention, and certainly an attack that inspired revolutionaries the world over.  My friend Greg Woolgar, who is about to publish a much needed book on the Victorian Bomb disposal expert and first proponent of IED exploitation and technical intelligence, Colonel Majendie, tells me that the good colonel visited St Petersburg in the aftermath to seek intelligence on the device.

Close Me
Looking for Something?
Search:
Post Categories: