Pipe-Bomb Unwittingly Carried Into School By Boy

[Sionnach Glic]

6 September 2010 Last updated at 16:07 GMT

School evacuated after boy picks up pipe bomb

Brendan Shannon describes what he saw in the grounds of the school

An eight-year-old boy risked serious injury when he picked up a pipe bomb in a school playground in Antrim.

Brendan Shannon, 8, from St Comgall's Primary School lifted what police confirmed was a viable device and brought it into the classroom.

Police were called and 400 children were moved from the school on Ballymena Road to a nearby church hall.

There was a second alert at St Joseph's Primary School in Antrim on Monday.

It followed a telephone warning to a local media outlet. Nothing was found.

Both alerts have now ended.

Brendan Shannon said he found what looked like a "golden pipe thing" in the playground at St Comgall's when he arrived for school.

"I just got off my bike and just touched it to see if it was okay," he said.

"Then I just lifted it up."

Brendan's father, Gerard, said the consequences could have been very serious.

"I was very worried and very scared when I heard that my son had gone out into the playground, saw something and lifted it up. I am trying not to think of what the consequences could have been."

St Comgall's headteacher Hilary Cush said he was outraged that an explosive device should be left for children to find.
School closed A viable explosive device was found at St Comgall's Primary School

"It's absolutely crazy. It's unbelievable that innocent children should be caught up in something like this," he said.

A search of St Joseph's at Greystone Road began at about 1030 BST. Pupils, including a nursery section, were moved to a nearby parish hall.

PSNI Chief Inspector Simon Walls area commander for the district has condemned those responsible for the alerts.

"I cannot express enough my disgust at the cowards involved in these alerts today.

"To target the general public is never acceptable by any means but to take away the secure feelings of innocent children and to put them at risk like this is beyond despicable.

"It is by sheer good fortune that we are not dealing with a severely injured child right now."

William McCrea, the Democratic Unionist Party MP for South Antrim, said the incident "was obscene and an utter disgrace".

He added: "It proves just how depraved some of those who want to drag Northern Ireland backwards are.

"To target a primary school and to put innocent children at risk is plumbing new depths."

SDLP South Antrim MLA Thomas Burns said: "There is obviously a group which is determined to cause mayhem in our town with these regular pipe bomb incidents, and until we know otherwise, we have to operate on the basis that they are prepared to cause murder as well.

Sinn Féin MLA for South Antrim, Mitchel McLaughlin said those who left the device showed a total disregard for the children's safety.

"We could have been dealing with unbearable tragedy today if this device had gone off," he said.

Fucking hell.

[Griffin]

Holy Fuck.

[Mikey]

Good thing all those problems are finished over there.

That's the difference between you guys and the inner-city areas over here - in the US, a boy that age would have known exactly what it was, and probably would have had a hand in building it.

[Captain Seafort]

That's the difference between you guys and the inner-city areas over here - in the US, a boy that age would have known exactly what it was, and probably would have had a hand in building it.

The difference between NI now and the US. 15-20 years ago that would probably have been true there as well.

[Mikey]

15 - 20 years ago, an 8-year-old in NI would have made the bomb, but he'd have brought it to the customs house, not to school.

[Captain Seafort]

15 - 20 years ago, an 8-year-old in NI would have made the bomb, but he'd have brought it to the customs house, not to school.

Depends on the town. In Belfast or Londonderry I wouldn't put it past anyone to carry the things around just in case the opportunity for a riot presented itself.

[Mikey]

Hmm. Dunno enough about the local attitudes of the time in Northern Ireland to comment on that. The impression I had (as an outsider, of course) was that most of the terrorism was directed at political targets, rather than random violence for its own sake.

[Captain Seafort]

Hmm. Dunno enough about the local attitudes of the time in Northern Ireland to comment on that. The impression I had (as an outsider, of course) was that most of the terrorism was directed at political targets, rather than random violence for its own sake.

Far from it - while the army and the RUC were certainly the Provos main targets, they were far from the only ones. Most of the violence was low-level thuggery, on both sides. Republicans killing Protestants because they were Protestant, Loyalists killing Catholics because they were Catholic. The peace lines through Belfast weren't there primarily to stop the IRA - they were there to stop everyone else starting a civil war. Whether or not they were successful is debatable.

[Tyyr]

This is one of those things where if they can find the people that did this, just shoot them. Don't put them in jail, don't play nice, just put a bullet in their head. If you pipe-bomb an elementary school the human race has no further use for you.

[Vic]

This is one of those things where if they can find the people that did this, just shoot them. Don't put them in jail, don't play nice, just put a bullet in their head. If you pipe-bomb an elementary school the human race has no further use for you.

Agreed.

[Sionnach Glic]

This is far from the worst such attempt on a school. Sometime last year I posted on the forum a news article stating that a very large car bomb (more like a van-bomb, IIRC) had been found parked right next to a school. Attempts on kids aren't unheard of, though, thankfully, they're not as common as they could be.

On the plus side, at least the IRA group making these bombs seems to have no idea on how to make a working detonator for them.

[Mikey]

On a side note, does "IRA" even mean anything anymore? It's not like a few decades ago... now, aren't there about 182 different groups with the term "IRA" somehow incorporated into their titles?

[Tyyr]

Actually I wouldn't be surprised if they were intended not to explode. Think about it. You get panic and fear out of the would-be bomb, not as much as one going off granted but... you also don't get the heat for lots and lots of tiny body bags. So while the upside (from a terrorists line of thinking) isn't as high as a bomb going off, it does dramatically temper the downside.

[Mikey]

The Northern Irish miltants don't seem to have worried about the body count for innocent civvies in the past.

[Tyyr]

Yeah but we're going through a whole new generation of militants and society has changed. You might get all the effect out of a pipebomb you used to, only now you don't even have to have it go off, you can just threaten it and let the people terrify themselves.