Explosives found at Greyhound bus terminal

Explosives found at Greyhound bus terminal

October 19, 2001


by Cindy Hamill





A suitcase of explosives was found at the Greyhound terminal in Philadelphia. Experts say there was enough material to blow up the entire station. NBC10’s Cindy Hamill has details.


PHILADELPHIA - Greyhound employees called police at about 10:30 Friday. They had found a suspicious device inside a suitcase left in one of the public lockers. Police called the bomb squad and evacuated the area.

The bomb squad took the device and tested it twice. They say it was in fact military grade explosives.

“Basically, what we had recovered was one third of a pound of C-4, which is a high explosives,” said Lieutenant Tom Fitzpatrick, from the Philadelphia Police Bomb Squad. “And approximately 1,000 feet of military detonation cord.”

Lieutenant Fitzpatrick says they found no detonators, nothing that would set off the explosives.

“You need a lot to get it to go,” Fitzptraick said. “You need a blasting cap and other explosives, but we were theorizing that there might have been another bag in there that was going to be used as a detonator, and then crank that off with it.”

The two types of explosives were in a suitcase. Even without a detonator Fitzpatrick calls it extremely dangerous.

“What it would do, it would’ve probably leveled the bus terminal,” Fitzpatrick said.