UK: IRISH REPUBLICAN ARMY BOMBS EXPLODE IN CENTRAL LONDON.

Record ID: 923453

  • Title: UK: IRISH REPUBLICAN ARMY BOMBS EXPLODE IN CENTRAL LONDON.
  • Date: 18th December 1978
  • Summary: 1. GV NIGHTSCENE The Oasis swimming pool in High Holborn, London, PAN TO officials clearing up bomb damage. 0.08 2. GV ZOOM INTO SV Twisted wreckage of car bomb. 0.19 3. GV Police vehicle. 0.22 4. GV London Central YMCA Building in Great Russell Street. 0.27 5. SV People and firemen on duty in cordoned off streets. 0.34 6. CU Car park entrance sign. 0.37 7. GV ZOOM INTO SV Wreckage of car bomb in underground carpark at YMCA. 0.54 8. GV PAN FROM Christmas tree TO people crowding into foyer of nearby hotel. 1.22 Initials JS Script is copyright Reuters Limited. All rights reserved
  • Embargoed: 1st February 2016 15:11
  • Keywords:
  • Location: LONDON, UK
  • City:
  • Country: United Kingdom
  • Reuters ID: LVA21KY1YOZJXKF5QVAY16M0L0NO
  • Aspect Ratio: 4:3
  • Story Text: After rocking central London with two car bombs, Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA) guerrillas warned Brittons on Monday night (18 December), that the attacks could be the start of a more devastating campaign. Two car bombs blew up just after midnight on Sunday (17 December) in London. Seven smaller bombs planted in shops in five British cities on Sunday wounded nine people.

    SYNOPSIS: The High Holborn area of London was the scene of the biggest blast. A thirty pound (13.6 kilogramme) bomb left in a hired car exploded not far from a government building. No one was hurt in the blast, which blew the car to pieces.

    Three minutes later the second car bomb blew up in a YMCA underground carpark, slightly injuring an old man. Police later found a third bomb in a car parked at another location in the West End. It was defused before it could explode. The IRA said they had deliberately chosen the targets in order to avoid casualties. The IRA later warned that, in future, both the targets and the timings might be changed.

    The Head of Scotland Yard's Bomb Squad, Commander Jim Nevill, appealed to the public to be vigilant and to check doorways and under cars for bombs. But the IRA said future attacks would depend on the performance of Britain's thirteen thousand soldiers in Northern Ireland, and their treatment of nearly one thousand Republican prisoners, in British and Northern Irish jails.
  • Copyright Holder: REUTERS
  • Copyright Notice: (c) Copyright Thomson Reuters 2016. Open For Restrictions - http://about.reuters.com/fulllegal.asp
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