Word: pentaerythritol
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...since 9/11, but terrorists have been far more aggressive about exploiting their weaknesses. Part of the problem is our chronically reactive approach to airline security: in military terms, the authorities are always fighting the last war. Ever since Richard Reid tried to ignite his shoes, loaded with the explosive pentaerythritol tetranitrate (PETN), on a flight from Paris to Miami in 2001, U.S. travelers have had to remove their footwear for scanning before boarding. After a plot to blow up several airliners over the Atlantic with small amounts of liquid explosives was uncovered in London in 2006, travelers were barred from...
...explosive Abdulmutallab allegedly used is called pentaerythritol tetranitrate (PETN), and it is powerful even in quantities as small as a hundredth of a pound. It comes from the same chemical family as nitroglycerin and has a long history of use in terrorist attacks. Though PETN itself is controlled, the chemicals used to make it aren't that hard to find - and Abdulmutallab or any other bombers would likely be able to obtain the explosive on the black market if they couldn't synthesize it themselves. The shoe bomber Richard Reid tried to use PETN to destroy a plane over...
...similar to those used in the Bali bomb blasts. While only a few kilograms were discovered, there was enough to kill scores if a bomb were set off in a confined, crowded space, a regional intelligence official says. Police also recovered 14 detonators and a volatile high explosive called pentaerythritol tetranitrate, or PENT, the prime component of the explosive in would-be bomber Richard Reid's sneakers. What worries terrorism experts is the possibility that a thwarted JI might turn to lone-wolf attacks like Reid's. "I don't think JI is capable of anything big right now," says...
Each shoe contained about 4 oz. of PETN (pentaerythritol tetranitrate), a powerful explosive produced by the ton for military and construction use. Some was mixed with a plasticizer to produce a substance that resembled putty. More was in short lengths of detonation cord, which looks like a clothes line and is used to cut heavy steel objects like girders. Packed around the PETN was a whitish powder that turned out to be homemade TATP, or triacetone triperoxide. If Reid had succeeded in lighting the fuses sticking out of his soles, the TATP would have blown instantly, setting off the less...
...prosecution will seek to reinforce its case by establishing that McVeigh was also in possession of a bomb. The most direct way to do that will be to call an FBI expert who will testify that McVeigh's clothing, tested after his arrest, showed traces of nitroglycerin and pentaerythritol tetranitrate, or petn, an explosive used in detonator cord. Prosecutors will also present evidence to show how, in the months before the bomb exploded, McVeigh set out to gather materials...