Are Liquid Explosives on a Plane Feasible?

permaculture writes "The Register describes the difficulty of mixing up a batch of liquid explosives on a plane. Further, it opines that such a plot might work in a Hollywood film, but not in the real world. Liquid explosives were used for the 7/7 London bombings in 2005, according to the official account — or not, as now seems more likely." This story selected and edited by LinuxWorld editor for the day Saied Pinto.

Explosives? dunno....

[zipthink (943185)]

but what about SNAKES on a plane, ever thought of that?

Re:Explosives? dunno....

[hamfactorial (857057)]

It may be feasible.... is snake venom explosive when combined with paranoia and sensationalism? Brilliant!

Re:Explosives? dunno....

[Tackhead (54550)]

> but what about SNAKES on a plane, ever thought of that?

No, you want that other movie. We're talkin' about muthafuckin' liquids [craphound.com] on a muthafuckin' plane, and there ain't a got-damn thing you can do about it!

The UK Terror plot: what's really going on?

[Jeremiah Cornelius (137)]

The UK Terror plot: what's really going on?
http://www.craigmurray.co.uk/archives/2006/08/the_ uk_terror_p.html [craigmurray.co.uk]

I have been reading very carefully through all the Sunday newspapers to try and analyse the truth from all the scores of pages claiming to detail the so-called bomb plot. Unlike the great herd of so-called security experts doing the media analysis, I have the advantage of having had the very highest security clearances myself, having done a huge amount of professional intelligence analysis, and having been inside the spin machine.

So this, I believe, is the true story.

None of the alleged terrorists had made a bomb. None had bought a plane ticket. Many did not even have passports, which given the efficiency of the UK Passport Agency would mean they couldn't be a plane bomber for quite some time.

In the absence of bombs and airline tickets, and in many cases passports, it could be pretty difficult to convince a jury beyond reasonable doubt that individuals intended to go through with suicide bombings, whatever rash stuff they may have bragged in internet chat rooms.

What is more, many of those arrested had been under surveillance for over a year - like thousands of other British Muslims. And not just Muslims. Like me. Nothing from that surveillance had indicated the need for early arrests.

Then an interrogation in Pakistan revealed the details of this amazing plot to blow up multiple planes - which, rather extraordinarily, had not turned up in a year of surveillance. Of course, the interrogators of the Pakistani dictator have their ways of making people sing like canaries. As I witnessed in Uzbekistan, you can get the most extraordinary information this way. Trouble is it always tends to give the interrogators all they might want, and more, in a desperate effort to stop or avert torture. What it doesn't give is the truth.

The gentleman being "interrogated" had fled the UK after being wanted for questioning over the murder of his uncle some years ago. That might be felt to cast some doubt on his reliability. It might also be felt that factors other than political ones might be at play within these relationships. Much is also being made of large transfers of money outside the formal economy. Not in fact too unusual in the British Muslim community, but if this activity is criminal, there are many possibilities that have nothing to do with terrorism.

We then have the extraordinary question of Bush and Blair discussing the possible arrests over the weekend. Why? I think the answer to that is plain. Both in desperate domestic political trouble, they longed for "Another 9/11". The intelligence from Pakistan, however dodgy, gave them a new 9/11 they could sell to the media. The media has bought, wholesale, all the rubbish they have been shovelled.

We then have the appalling political propaganda of John Reid, Home Secretary, making a speech warning us all of the dreadful evil threatening us and complaining that "Some people don't get" the need to abandon all our traditional liberties. He then went on, according to his own propaganda machine, to stay up all night and minutely direct the arrests. There could be no clearer evidence that our Police are now just a political tool. Like all the best nasty regimes, the knock on the door came in the middle of the night, at 2.30am. Those arrested included a mother with a six week old baby.

For those who don't know, it is worth introducing Reid. A hardened Stalinist with a long term reputation for personal violence, at Stirling Univeristy he was the Communist Party's "Enforcer", (in days when the Communist Party ran Stirling University Students' Union, which it should not be forgotten was a business with a very substantial cash turnover). Reid was sent to beat up those who deviated from the Party line.

We will now never know if any of those arrested would have gone on to make a bomb or buy a plane t

Re:The UK Terror plot: what's really going on?

[illumin8 (148082)]

The UK Terror plot: what's really going on?

Does anybody else find it suspicious that this story was leaked to the media the day after Joe Lieberman lost the democratic primary in Connecticut? This was one of the key primaries that seems to have indicated to everybody in the Republican party that they were definitely going to lose big in November. Joe Lieberman was with Bush on the war, and this was not only the democrats in his party telling him he was wrong on the war; 15,000 Connecticut voters switched parties from independent or republican, just so that they could tell Joe Lieberman to get lost...

The republicans are losing support big time over here. Finally the majority of people in this country do see through their bullshit, and short of another 9/11, there is no way the republicans can stop it.

Craig Murray

[replicant108 (690832)]

The article quoted is by Craig Murray [wikipedia.org] - an ex-ambassador to Uzbekistan, who gained notoriety by blowing the whistle on the UK's support for Uzbekistan's torturers.

Needless to say, Mr Murray paid a heavy price [wikipedia.org] for his candour.

Re:The UK Terror plot: what's really going on?

[by Anonymous Coward]

Occam's Razor, unless I'm greatly mistaken, basically states that the simplest answer is probably correct.

Which is the most simple explanation? That a bunch of people who don't have passports, plane tickets or (if the Register article is to be believed) the remotest understanding of explosives presented a genuine threat? Or that someone didn't really care what kind of threat they represented wanted to present themselves as the good guys by having "saved" us from this threat?

I'm slightly scared to post this, as I don't want to mysteriously commit suicide in the woods.

Liquid Explosion

[draggy (30660)]

Borat is able to do liquid explosions

Re:Liquid Explosion

[dr_dank (472072)]

Can I make a dirt in here?

Terrorist true mission?

[noretsa (995866)]

Does anyone else think that these terrorists' true purpose is not to kill the passengers on a few planes but to inconvenience travellers for years to come? Blowing up a plane is a one-time deal but scaring people into not taking drinks onto planes, making people take off their shoes before boarding, checking their ipods in with their luggage, these annoyances are going to be with us for decades to come! Why terrorize when irritating is so much easier?

It has been done!

[lunartik (94926)]

Christ, this has . [wikipedia.org]

No need for an explosion

[andrewman327 (635952)]

Here is [howstuffworks.com] another source on the issue.

I was shocked to hear the media talking about the possibility of bring nitroglycerin onto an airplane. The entire reason that dynamite was invented is because the liquid is horribly volitile. Some people have speculated that the terrorists were not attempting a large scale explosion as CNN and Fox News would have you believe. Instead they were waiting until the plane was in the middle of the Atlantic and starting a fairly large fire. There are many substances that can create a dangerous fire on an airplane in the middle of the ocean at 30,000 feet. There is no need for a Holywood style explosion at all. I am being intentionally vague in this post, but three men with drink containers full of certain substances starting three fires at three different parts of the plane would be extremely difficult to control, especially considering the lack of fire surpression systems in the passenger cabin. I am not a firefighter (rookie EMT and will be training to be a rescuer) but I cannot imagine trying to put out three fires with the 1-2 fire extingueshers available.

The first World Trade Center bombing and OK City show that everyday chamicals can be combined with horrific results. In those situations, however, there were truckloads of the two ingredients. I agree in part with TFA that it would be hard to perform an explosion the size of Pan-Am 103's with liquids, but that is not necesary.

Nitro on a plane

[toupsie (88295)]

The "Mark II" "microbombs" had Casio digital watches as the timers, stabilizers that looked like cotton wool balls, and an undetectable nitroglycerin as the explosive. Other ingredients included glycerin, nitrate, sulfuric acid, and minute concentrations of nitrobenzene, silver azide (silver trinitride), and liquid acetone. Two 9-volt batteries in each bomb were used as a power source. The batteries would be connected to light bulb filaments that would detonate the bomb. Murad and Yousef wired an SCR as the switch to trigger the filaments to detonate the bomb. There was an external socket hidden when the wires were pushed under the watch base as the bomber would wear it. The alteration was so small that the watch could still be worn in a normal manner.

Read up! [wikipedia.org]

Another chemist's view

[quitcherbitchen (587409)]

Bruce Schneier linked to another post [schneier.com] which had an interesting take by a chemist in a graduate program. He describes details of the chemicals involved and what it would take to detonate them effectively onboard a plane.

The summary: improvised explosives involve pretty nasty stuff that you'd be hard pressed to mix in an airplane lavatory without killing yourself in the process.

In a word? No.

[Guysmiley777 (880063)]

Firstly, the 7/7 bombs were reported to be TATP. This compound is made with acetone, hydrogen peroxide and drain cleaner. The ingredients are liquid, yes, but the end product is a powder. Creating TATP requires access to a cooler or ice water bath, it is not something you can whip up in a bathroom.

The hysteria this has caused is mind boggling. There are an infinite number of ways terrorists could attack random innocent civilians. It is not, repeat not, possible to protect everyone from everything. Banning iPods and water bottles is not making anyone safer. It is an attempt to appear that something is "being done". It's a pacifier for the masses.

An even better article

[jgs (245596)]

Perry Metzger wrote an excellent post [interesting-people.org] to the interesting-people mailing list last Friday. He goes into more detail than the Register article does, offers first-hand information, and packs in more irony and sarcasm besides.

It's all hype anyway

[LS (57954)]

There are so many problems with this. Why weren't liquids blocked before? I'm sure in the billions they spent investigating possible methods for bombing a plane that liquid explosives were considered. Authorities aren't gonna make people get on planes naked, so they have to let people take stuff on. They are only blocking liquids now because they have to show the public that they are doing something. There are still dozens of other ways to easily get dangerious stuff onto planes, but they don't block those now, do they? easy examples: Sharp pencils and pens, materials in laptops and other electronics that show up as normal shapes on the xray but could easily be reconfigured into weapons, etc.

In any event I just took a flight from China to Los Angeles and they claimed you couldn't bring liquids aboard, but no one was checking. It's all just noise to make people feel like they are being protected.

Why so complicated. How about bleach + ammonia?

[brobak (683932)]

You know, I've read several articles now talking about the potential difficulties in mixing a binary explosive on a plane. And you know, I'll buy that. But, for my dollar, and ease of use, why not just carry on some bleach and ammonia? When mixed they do some pretty nasty stuff [bbc.co.uk]. And there's no concern about explosion beforehand, and no strange requirements for mixing them properly. Plus, once you mix them, you can't stop the reaction. The end result is the same. Everyone on the plane dies, and it falls out of the sky. That was the whole point, right?

Re:Flight 505 to MacGyver City...

[Khyber (864651)]

Except Nitro Glycerine would most likely detonate the second you had any turbulence, or even upon takeoff, given how unstable it is. Now if you wanted to make a bomb out of liquids - why not just bring a bottle of water and a piece of rubidium or cesium? Remember what happens when alkali metals hit water? BOOM! Two grams of cesium and a quart of water is enough to make an explosion roughly equivalent to about three or so hand grenades going off. Water and rubidium can blow apart a bathtub. Cesium is far, far more reactive.

Re:Flight 505 to MacGyver City...

[deanpole (185240)]

You mean as Brainiac shows in this video [google.com].

Re:Flight 505 to MacGyver City...

[kannibal_klown (531544)]

It's also a medication. Has anyone ever determined how easy it is to concentrate Nitroglycerine from a medical prescription into something that can bring down a plane?

MacGuyver did that once. To break out of a European medical center (asylum perhaps?) he ground up nitro tablets, mixed them with something, and blew a hole in a cement wall. Then again, this is Macguyver we're talking here so I'm sure the writers could have had him create an explosion out of contact-lense solution if they wanted.

That door is staying closed until you land

[jgs (245596)]

Not quite sure what your point was, but the idea of opening an airplane door in mid-flight has been thoroughly debunked. For example, see Patrick Smith's Salon Article [salon.com] on the subject (mind-bending advertisements or oppressive money-grubbing subscription may be required). In short, you can't open the door because there's a lot of air pressure holding it shut. From the cited article,
 

At a typical cruising altitude, as many as 8 pounds of pressure are pushing against every square inch of interior fuselage. That's 1,152 pounds of weight against each square foot of door. Flying at low altitudes, where cabin-pressure levels are lower, even a differential of 2 pounds per square inch is still more than anyone can displace -- even after six cups of coffee and the frustration that comes with sitting behind a shrieking infant for five hours.

Of course, if you don't believe him you can try it for yourself. Remember to pack a hydraulic jack in your carry-on.

Re:False Flag.

[bunions (970377)]

Libertarians appear out of fucking nowhere; roll for save vs. simple solutions to complex problems.

Re:False Flag.

[spun (1352)]

Libertarians are like mind flayers. Fail your saving throw and lose several points of intelligence.

*Terrorists*, huh?

[Silent sound (960334)]

What I see there is a Pakistani woman caught with a water bottle full of "possibly explosive [reuters.com]" material. They don't know what the material was yet.

This certainly could be "a terrorist caught with explosives", the conclusion you jump to; given that it was a real possibility, evacuating the airport and investigating further as they have done was of course the appropriate course of action for the time being.

But it also seems possible this is a false alarm, similar to this morning when a bomb sniffing dog [nwsource.com] detected a suspicious container that turned out to be full of completely ordinary rags, or the day before when an "unruly passenger" was widely reported to have "Vaseline, a screw driver, matches and a note referencing al-Qaeda [news24.com]" and then it turned out she had nothing of the kind [tvnz.co.nz] and was just having some kind of nervous breakdown and peeing in the plane aisles (?), or a couple days before that when three men of Arabic descent were arrested with a bunch of cell phones on suspicion they were going to blow up a bridge [record-eagle.com] but then turned out only to be buying cell phones to resell in Dallas at a profit.

Again, it could be that this woman arrested in West Virginia was part of a real terrorist plot, and it could be that some unhinged lady was inspired by recent media reports about plane bombs to pour lighter fluid in a couple of water bottles and attempt to board a plane. Perhaps there really was a legitimate threat to passenger safety there. I shall be watching the news on this one with interest to find out exactly what happened.

But until we do find out exactly what happened, it seems awfully odd in this case to say "reality has intervened" when in fact what you mean is "partly speculative media reports have intervened".