Movie terrorist bombs.

 

 I was watching something a few days back with a terrorist bomb in it and it got me thinking how daft TV and movies are with bombs.

 They seem to roughly fall into a few different patterns.  Theres the smaller "stick" on bomb usually with a red flashing light.... Why?  The idea is to hide the bomb, it's like the old fashioned round cartoon bombs with a sparking fuse on the top and the word bomb written on it... Errr most people know what it is, the word on the side is pointless.... especially if the plan is to kill the people who see it. 

 You can imagine the "die hard" real conversation cant you.  "Is that John McClane the ex New York cop hiding in the ventilation system?  this is Hans Gruber".   "Yeah what do you want Hans?".  "My men will find you McClane, and the building is rigged with bombs, you'll never find them in a million years".    "Are those bombs the ones with the big red flashing light you can see from 50 yards away?".    "Errrrr, well sort of.... Bollocks, who put bloody lights on them!".   You get the idea.

 The next type are the type of bomb, with countdown timers and usually red or blue wires to cut, get the wrong one and t's half a day out with the undertaker (think lethal weapon)  Trouble with that plot is bomb makers wont make it easy for you, they'll just use all black wires, or whatever colour they have handy.  They dont need to colour code it, they are not planning on taking it apart.

 The last of the more common types in movies is the insanly complicated bomb, yes the one with a thousand wires, computers, and most seem to favor multicolour liquids mixing in a chamber... Why. just way?  A terrorists aim is to create terror, having a simple yet effective device, yes some bombs are complex, the IRA for example went from bloody awful early bombs to quite sophisticated, that was after blowing up quite a few of their own chaps mind. They ended up pretty much the go-to bomb teachers for other terror groups.

 The mixing liquids is just trying to make it look better on the screen and add drama.  Don't get me wrong, there are bombs made with different liquids, most though are basic and simple, either standard stolen/scroungedcommercial explosive, or the simpler home made and slightly dodgy versions.  These home made types tend to suffer a few minor drawbacks, they either wont go off when they are supposed to (some need a proper explosive to actually start the reaction) or worse from the bombers point of view is they go off whan they feel like it (a plus for us) this was the IRA's biggest problem in the early day, home goals the army called them.

 Thats not to say real life cant make a complen bomb though.  back in 1980 a man called  John Birges Sr made a bomb so complex the FBI failed to defuse it.  The bomb had I think 8 different fusing systems, it had motion sensors, an anti drill casing, heck it even had a float incase they tried to fill it with liquid, and lots of other tricky stuff.  

 The FBI came up with their best answer an explosive disrupter, this would cut the metal bomb box in half.... well it sort of worked, it did cut the bomb in half-ish... to be more precise it set it off. The bomb went bang, and a fair bit of Harveys casino hotel went with it (the bomb was in the casino hotel) in total the damage ran to around 18 million dollars.  Birges got life in prison, and died there in 1996.

 What puzzles me is why movies cant get it right.  Fine ok we don't want to show the bad guys and nutters how to make a real bomb, that would be a bad idea.  But at least cut down on the sillyness.... Pretty please!