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Design & materials of Jammu drone attack IEDs ‘point to Pakistan Ordnance factories’

Preliminary report on IEDs dropped by drones has confirmed that RDX was used, and that both devices were packed with about 1.5-2 kg of explosives.

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New Delhi: The Improvised Explosive Devices (IEDs) used in the 27 June drone attack on the Air Force Station in Jammu are likely to have had their origins in ordnance factories of the Pakistan military, ThePrint has learnt.

Sources in the defence and security establishment said the preliminary report on the IEDs indicated they were not crude, as earlier believed. Certain design elements — their shape, and the fact that they had a pressure fuse — pointed to military expertise, they added.

According to the sources, the preliminary report confirmed that RDX was used, and that both IEDs were packed with about 1.5-2 kg of explosives.

A final report from the Central Forensic Science Laboratory (CFSL) is awaited, which will confirm if only RDX or a mixture of explosives was used, they said.


Also Read: India must strike to deter, any other policy for drone attacks will play into Pakistan’s hands


‘Not made-at-home kind’

The drone attack last month was the first instance of a terror strike carried out through unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs). The exact number of drones involved has yet to be determined, and investigators have still not been able to pinpoint where they came from. 

However, a source said the initiation of the blast was a “pressure fuse, which is generally military ordnance and not a normal IED”.

A pressure fuse refers to one that gets activated on impact.

The IEDs used in the Jammu attack were not the simple make-at-home kind, sources said.

The design and materials used in the IEDs — such as RDX, initiation mechanism, internal serration in the metal container — were aimed at generating a large number of fragments on explosion to act as shrapnel, sources said. 

The IEDs, a second source noted, were “fabricated” in a steel container.  

“The specific shape of the two IEDs, as per their operational requirement, indicates the IEDs to be ordnance-factory-level work,” the source added.

This, the sources said, was an indication that at least the elements of the IEDs — if not the devices in entirety — had their origins in one of the ordnance factories of the Pakistani military.

“It was a sophisticated IED which shows high knowledge and expertise,” a third source said.

The Air Traffic Control is believed to have been the target of the 27 June drone attack. Since two IEDs were dropped at different places, it is also suspected that the ATC along with the helicopter hangar could have been the target.

(Edited by Sunanda Ranjan)


Also Read: IAF plans to buy 10 anti-drone systems from Indian vendors after Jammu air base attack


 

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