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WIRED Tradecraft – FBI Agent Explains How Bombs Are Disposed Of
00:00 [intense nervous music] 00:06 [explosion blasting] 00:07 [explosion blasting] 00:08 [explosion blasting] 00:10 [explosion blasting] 00:11 [Narrator] Improvised explosion devices, 00:13 there’s no set standard on how that’s gonna look. 00:16 So every time we encounter a device, it’s different 00:19 and we have to take all the precautions 00:21 necessary to protect ourselves.…

00: 00
[intense nervous music]
00: 06
[explosion blasting]
00: 07
[explosion blasting]
00: 08
[explosion blasting]
00: 10
[explosion blasting]
00: 11
[Narrator] Improvised explosion devices,
00: 13
there’s now not any location customary on how that is gonna search.
00: 16
So whenever we come across a tool, it be assorted
00: 19
and we have got to make a selection the complete precautions
00: 21
famous to supply protection to ourselves.
00: 23
[Narrator] Fireplace within the outlet.
00: 25
[explosion blasting]
00: 32
My establish is John Stewart.
00: 35
I am a unit chief of the Unsafe Devices College.
00: 37
[suspenseful music] I started off
00: 38
within the United States Navy.
00: 39
I was an enlisted EOD tech for 12 years
00: 42
and then used to be employed as an FBI agent.
00: 44
My foremost mission used to be to produce make stronger
00: 46
to our pronounce and native bomb technicians.
00: 48
I’ve replied to a selection of calls.
00: 50
Those calls resulted within the discovery of protection power ordnance,
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hand grenades, improvised explosion laboratories
00: 57
the assign of us are making selfmade explosives.
00: 59
Those calls resulted in us disrupting pipe bombs.
01: 02
In the event that they wanted me to costume out in a bomb suit
01: 04
and fling to a fluctuate, I am trained and capable to complete that.
01: 07
In the event that they need me for post blast skills
01: 09
to help them procure proof,
01: 11
we’re there to help them halt that because that all
01: 13
falls within the category of bomb technician responsibilities.
01: 18
I labored a selection of cases on the realm
01: 20
terrorism facet, I spent roughly two years
01: 23
in Afghanistan working as a FBI bomb technician
01: 27
conducting post blast evaluation and evaluation of IEDs
01: 31
for the US govt.
01: 33
[explosion blasting] So if something blew up
01: 34
out in metropolis, we would fling out
01: 35
and forestall a post blast investigation,
01: 38
get better the complete diagram shall we receive,
01: 40
bring that again into a managed surroundings
01: 42
and then are trying to recreate and make a selection
01: 44
precisely how that IED functioned.
01: 48
After which I was ready to come to the Unsafe Devices College
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and switch out to be a licensed public security bomb technician.
01: 55
[explosion blasting]
01: 58
IED manner improvised explosive tool.
02: 01
By the mere duration of time, it be improvised
02: 03
and they are available in all shapes and varieties.
02: 05
They’ll need to maintain some draw of energy supply
02: 07
or some draw of approach to obtain warmth into the explosives.
02: 10
They’ll need to maintain some draw of switch.
02: 12
They’ll need to maintain some draw of container
02: 14
and they’ll need to maintain conductors
02: 16
and wires and things admire that.
02: 17
While you make a selection an x-ray of an IED,
02: 20
you are procuring for the foremost diagram.
02: 21
You are procuring for the explosive rate,
02: 23
you are procuring for the switch,
02: 25
and also you are procuring for battery energy to receive out
02: 27
whether or now not it be an IED or now not.
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There are two assorted forms of explosives.
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There are high explosives and low explosives
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and those if truth be told are in accordance with the deflagration or burn fee
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or the flexibility for the explosives
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to trade from a solid to a gaseous pronounce.
02: 40
Low explosives burn or deflagrate and high explosives
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trade from solid to a gas in microseconds.
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[explosion blasting]
02: 52
After we’re coping with IEDs,
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some in total is a low explosive or a powder,
02: 56
some is also high explosives.
02: 58
Protection power ordnance uses high explosives inner of it.
03: 02
Low explosives are customarily viewed
03: 04
in some draw of contained vessel
03: 06
admire a pipe bomb or a tension cooker.
03: 08
The tension cooker is a outmoded
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tension cooker that holds tension,
03: 12
has a low explosive in it that burns
03: 15
and because it burns the tension cooker
03: 16
contains the low explosive affect up
03: 19
until it can’t procure it anymore and then it overcomes
03: 22
the tension cooker and explodes.
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It be a mechanical explosion.
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[crowd cheering] [distant announcer talking]
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[explosion blasting]
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As you realize, the Boston bombing,
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they broken-down tension cookers in there.
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Each person who used to be ready to search around that on TV
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and quiz it via details reports witnessed what came about.
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So we had several bombs that blew up
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on the streets of Boston. [sirens blaring]
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Fellas, look for secondary devices!
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Following that event,
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there used to be an evacuation that came about.
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They eradicated the wounded.
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The bomb technicians then must fling in and forestall some
03: 54
threat overview and analyze all the pieces left to receive out
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whether or now not there’s any longer bombs within the distance.
04: 01
As you are going to be ready to contemplate there are backpacks
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and packing containers in each place the avenue,
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and so they maintain to fling and threat assess
04: 07
their contrivance via all of those applications
04: 09
to receive out if there’s any longer bombs
04: 11
that pose a doable hazard for the public.
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We categorize IEDs into three assorted classes.
04: 18
We maintain victim initiated that manner the victim
04: 21
has to complete something to fabricate it fling off.
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We maintain time, that manner in a particular amount of time
04: 25
it be gonna detonate and then we have got radio managed
04: 29
or some distance away make a selection watch over that manner but another individual
04: 31
is controlling when that tool is gonna detonate.
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An improvised explosive tool gifts
04: 36
a selection of non-public wretchedness disorders.
04: 38
Needless to claim there is a fragmentation arena that comes with it.
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The fragmentation is gonna destroy home windows,
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it be gonna penetrate skin, it be gonna wretchedness of us,
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it be gonna execute property.
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Every explosion carries a thermal enact,
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so admire a warmth wave or warmth ball
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or fire ball that comes off.
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There’s a doable for things to purchase on fire and burn
04: 58
thanks to the fireplace ball that comes off of that explosive.
05: 02
[explosion blasting]
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After which there’s what we consult with because the blast wave.
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It be the invisible wave of tension that flies out.
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[explosion blasting]
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The blast tension affects glass, it affects ear drums,
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interior organs, and things admire that.
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But we have got calculations that we exhaust to receive out
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how some distance to evacuate of us to help us to produce
05: 23
better protection from fragmentation and overpressure.
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[intense nervous music]
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The Unsafe Devices College curriculum
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used to be first and foremost developed by the Department of the Navy.
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We took the ways, programs, and procedures
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that the protection power used to be instructing their bomb techs
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when they were coping with IEDs
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and we broken-down that identical details
05: 41
to fabricate our usual curriculum again in 1971.
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The Vietnam War used to be drawing down and bomb technicians
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from the Vietnam War were coming again,
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going to work for police departments
05: 51
and performing bomb tech actions.
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This college is designed to coach
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public security law enforcement who draw now not maintain any details
06: 00
about bombs, the complete programs, ways, and procedures
06: 03
to be deployed and broken-down
06: 05
when they’re engaged on suspicious devices.
06: 07
Throughout coaching there are plenty of key areas
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we admire bomb techs to fling away right here with.
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I mediate the most attention-grabbing one is their skill
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to habits a threat overview.
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To search at something and to study up on to receive out
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in their thoughts why it be there and what’s potentially
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gonna motive it to fling off.
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You should know electronics so whenever you are inspecting
06: 26
your x-rays and also you quiz sure things within the x-ray,
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it be crucial to be ready to receive out what they’re.
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You should know pointers on how to poke a robot,
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factual if you’re going to be ready to halt it remotely.
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You should know pointers on how to make exhaust of explosives
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because many of the instruments they exhaust within the sphere
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are explosively-pushed instruments.
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So it be crucial to know pointers on how to soundly address explosives
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to load those instruments and space them and fire them.
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[explosion blasting]
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[sirens rapidly blaring]
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Bomb squads across The United States obtain bomb calls frequently.
06: 55
As soon as their dispatch receives a call,
06: 57
they manufacture a notification to the bomb squad.
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The bomb squad then goes to the scene.
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As soon as there, they meet with an on scene commander
07: 05
or the individual to blame
07: 06
and they’re making an attempt to procure some intelligence.
07: 08
What is it, the assign is it, how did it obtain there,
07: 11
how prolonged has it been there,
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al of those questions are requested.
07: 14
But another mountainous crucial section is,
07: 16
is there an evacuation that has came about?
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Have we moved the complete of us out some distance ample so if this part
07: 21
were to detonate earlier than we made it down fluctuate,
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they’d now not be wretchedness?
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As soon as all of that is taken space,
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there is a call, will we halt this remotely with robots
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or will we have got to assign someone within the bomb suit?
07: 32
If we can affect the complete actions we need with a robot,
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it be sent down fluctuate to affect x-rays.
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They’ll fire instruments off of the robot,
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they’ll halt a selection of things
07: 42
that prevents a bomb technician
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from having to obtain into a bomb suit
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and in spite of all the pieces occurring fluctuate.
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[explosion blasting] [murmuring]
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But as soon as rapidly there are instances
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when the robot is now not going to work.
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Depending on the assign the tool is at,
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hoping on the complex arena we have got,
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there’s doable for the bomb technician
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to even must obtain in a bomb suit
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and fling down and forestall the preliminary work.
08: 07
Assemble an outline of the tool,
08: 09
affect passive diagnostics,
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make a selection x-rays, and then space a disruption tool.
08: 15
As soon as that is accomplished, all americans falls again to a stable space
08: 18
and they affect an action to disrupt that kit.
08: 24
So the technique of hanging the bomb technician
08: 26
within the bomb suit is slightly easy
08: 28
alternatively it takes a selection of of us to complete it.
08: 30
So honest now they’re hanging on the trousers.
08: 33
The trousers are Kevlar and Nomex
08: 35
and they present protection to the decrease extremities.
08: 40
There’s additionally a again protector that affords very restricted
08: 44
protection to your again.
08: 47
So after the trousers are on,
08: 48
the bomb technicians will affix
08: 50
the built-in groin protector and that affords restricted
08: 53
thermal protection and ballistic protection
08: 58
He is now hanging on a balaclava.
09: 00
That helps present protection to the helmet
09: 02
and make a selection up the sweat and the bomb technician
09: 05
is performing his tasks.
09: 06
The next fragment of instruments
09: 07
that will fling on the bomb technician is the helmet.
09: 10
That is the EOD 9 helmet.
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That’s a visor that strikes up and down.
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So when the bomb tech is down fluctuate next to the tool,
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he would maintain the visor pulled down.
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The next fragment of instruments they’ll attach on is the jacket.
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It’s miles a Nomex Kevlar manufacture up.
09: 27
The mountainous shadowy plate you quiz on the entrance
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is a Kevlar defend.
09: 30
It affords most protection from fragmentation
09: 33
to the crucial organ space.
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They then tighten Velcro across the wrist of the jacket,
09: 38
offering the bomb technician dexterity
09: 40
along with his fingers whereas he’s working.
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On the left facet you are going to quiz a make a selection watch over panel.
09: 45
That make a selection watch over panel controls the fan inner of the helmet
09: 48
to help make a selection watch over physique temperature.
09: 50
It additionally helps the defend from fogging up
09: 52
and there’s lights on the helmet that the bomb tech,
09: 55
if desired, can flip on.
09: 57
Correct now they’re gonna lift the collar up,
09: 59
offering protection for the neck space
10: 02
between the outlet the assign the helmet and the jacket meet.
10: 06
So that you just are going to study about that the hands are usually now not lined.
10: 09
That’s for most dexterity.
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The bomb tech must be ready to work with instruments
10: 13
and whenever you attach gloves on him,
10: 14
it restricts his skill to make exhaust of his fingers and hands.
10: 18
[intense curious music]
10: 18
As soon as the bomb squad arrives on scene
10: 20
and they procure their intelligence,
10: 22
they maintain to receive out what draw of skill they manufacture.
10: 24
In the event that they make a selection that they maintain to connect a bomb technician
10: 27
down for time heading within the correct direction, there is a couple things
10: 30
that they maintain to complete.
10: 31
So that they’ll costume the bomb technician out within the bomb suit
10: 33
and then they wanna lumber down fluctuate
10: 36
and habits a threat overview
10: 37
and some diagnostics of that kit.
10: 41
A technique they habits diagnostics is via their imaginative and prescient.
10: 44
What is it, the assign’s it at,
10: 46
and why is it sitting the assign it be sitting?
10: 48
Subsequent part they’d halt is make a selection a x-ray of the kit.
10: 52
This machine generates x-rays that poke via the kit
10: 55
and gifts a image on a phosphorus panel.
10: 57
The bomb tech would attach the phosphorus panel
10: 59
within the again of the suspect kit and then generate some pulses
11: 02
with this to obtain an x-ray.
11: 05
They’re going to additionally bring down some instruments to complete some work
11: 07
because we make a selection to sever time heading within the correct direction.
11: 10
That’s time that a individual is standing next to the tool.
11: 14
And additionally they’ll space those after they affect their x-ray
11: 16
for a outmoded total cause shot.
11: 19
They’re going to return and manufacture the x-ray
11: 21
and if the x-ray has sure that it’s an accurate tool
11: 23
they’ll fire those instruments
11: 25
without ever having to skill the tool again.
11: 29
Right here’s a pan disruptor.
11: 30
Very total within the bomb technician world.
11: 33
It be a percussion actuated, non-electrically fired tool.
11: 37
the pan disruptor is a steel tube
11: 39
that uses shotgun cartridges.
11: 41
We are going to possess this tube fleshy of water.
11: 43
We are going to inch it on the halt.
11: 45
We are going to attach a blank shotgun shell
11: 47
into the halt of it and then we exhaust what is named a breech.
11: 50
It has a firing pin that is then projected forward
11: 53
by an explosively-pushed shockwave from shock tube.
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[Woman] Three, two, one.
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[explosion blasting]
12: 01
That contrivance, we can fire that remotely and the bomb
12: 03
technician doesn’t maintain to be wherever across the kit.
12: 07
But another tool that could be very total is a mineral water bottle.
12: 10
On the interior of this bottle is a plastic
12: 12
tube that is stuffed with C4 explosives.
12: 15
Right here’s an omnidirectional tool
12: 17
so whenever you detonate the C4,
12: 19
that water is gonna strike the kit
12: 21
and with any luck disrupt the suspect kit
12: 23
that we’re engaged on.
12: 24
This is in a position to maybe even be fired a selection of assorted programs,
12: 26
but customarily it be fired with a Primadet
12: 29
with non-electrical shock two.
12: 31
A Primadet is nothing better than a non-electrical type
12: 34
blasting cap that is curved to shock tube
12: 37
and there’s customarily an explosive wave that goes down
12: 40
and it initiates the explosives within the tube.
12: 44
Surely one of many instruments available
12: 45
to the bomb technician is a hydrojet.
12: 47
Right here’s a 32 ounce hydrojet.
12: 49
It be a directional rate,
12: 51
that manner it be stuffed with water.
12: 53
This plastic sheet inner is fashioned to fabricate a V.
12: 57
It’s probably you’ll maybe maybe presumably make a selection details sheet or sheet explosives
12: 59
and affix it to this V.
13: 01
It then goes again into the hydrojet that is stuffed with water
13: 05
and it be fired with a Primadet.
13: 07
As soon because it be fired, the projection of the explosives
13: 10
drives the water into a knife
13: 13
and cuts via suspect applications.
13: 15
[explosion blasting]
13: 17
[intense curious music]
13: 19
Since the inception of the curriculum,
13: 20
there’s been rather plenty of trade within the bomb tech community.
13: 23
Explosives are composed the identical.
13: 25
IEDs, the devices that we address,
13: 27
but for sure with computers and being ready to obtain online
13: 30
and study, the sophistication of those maintain risen.
13: 33
[mechanical whirring]
13: 34
Most considerably is our instruments that we exhaust
13: 37
to complete diagnostics and disrupt IEDs
13: 39
maintain elevated dramatically.
13: 41
[explosion blasting]
13: 42
Our x-ray programs are about a of the most attention-grabbing within the arena.
13: 45
Our disruption instruments are about a of the most attention-grabbing within the arena
13: 48
and they’re all designed to produce extra protection
13: 51
for the bomb tech whereas he’s performing those tasks,
13: 53
which in flip affords extra protection for our public.
13: 57
Usually, procedures that are trained
13: 59
right here at the Unsafe Devices College
14: 00
are employed out in our cities and states across The United States.
14: 04
It occurs frequently, the assign bomb squads
14: 06
are notified of suspicious applications.
14: 08
That occurs across The United States each day.
14: 10
There’s now not any playbook that claims, if it be this, halt this.
14: 14
Or if it be that, halt that.
14: 16
We must make exhaust of the instruments and programs that we’re taught.
14: 18
We must make exhaust of a great threat overview
14: 21
and we have started working our contrivance
14: 22
via each arena we come across.

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