Word: bombs
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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There are two basic types of smart bombs-those guided by television and those led by laser beams. TV bombs, like the Navy's 3,000-lb. Walleye (so named for the glassy lens in its snout), can be dropped from an altitude of 30,000 ft., far above the reach of most antiaircraft artillery. As the bomb glides toward the target on a free-falling trajectory, the pilot, who monitors the flight on a television receiver, can adjust its course by remote control, or the bomb, having "memorized" the picture of the target with its built-in electronic...
...crowd of Belfast Catholics was watching an evening soccer game on the television set in Kellys Bar when a bomb exploded in a parked car outside, setting off a weekend of violence in which nine people were killed and 100 injured. The Catholics blamed the bombing on Protestant extremists; the British army concluded that it might have been caused by I.R.A. explosives that went off by accident. In a sense it did not really matter. The important fact was that after two months of direct rule from London, the Ulstermen were as close to anarchy as ever...
...ship is considerably more difficult to hijack than a 100-ton jet. On the other hand, a 963-ft. ocean liner contains more hiding places for anyone who wants to stow a bomb aboard. Last week the British liner Queen Elizabeth 2 was in mid-ocean when an extortionist telephoned Cunard Lines and demanded a queen's ransom of $350,000. Six bombs were hidden aboard the Queen and ready to detonate, the caller warned. They had been placed there by an ex-convict and a terminal cancer victim who were fatalistically prepared to be blown sky-high along...
Cunard was "99½% sure" that the call was a hoax, Chairman Victor Matthews reported later. Nevertheless the company procured the cash in Manhattan and waited for a second call, which never came. Meanwhile, at an R.A.F. base in Wiltshire, England, a four-man bomb-disposal team climbed aboard a long-range Hercules transport and strapped on parachutes. When the plane made its rendezvous with the liner 1,400 miles west of England in the Atlantic, the men plummeted through the clouds and rain to land close beside a waiting launch...
...Queen Elizabeth 2 picked up speed again and headed flat out for Cherbourg, the bomb experts commenced an almost impossible assignment. No fewer than 12,000 pieces of passenger baggage, for instance, had been loaded aboard three days earlier during a record seven-hour turnaround in New York. The passengers seemed to be undaunted. Orchestras played, champagne corks popped and a crew member reported that "everyone is drinking and dancing as usual...