Controlled Det

A controlled det (detonation) means we (US military) blew something up on purpose, usually it is explosives that we have recovered from outside the base. The pictures above are controlled dets from today. Last week one of the army patrols discovered a very large VBIED, vehicle based improvised explosive device. It was a truck loaded with 4000-5500 lbs of explosives, the weight varies depending on who we have talked to. All branches of the service have explosives experts, one career field I would have no interest in. These guys like to play with bombs, they are the ones who go out and recover these bombs or difuse them or blow them in place.

In this case they brought the truck loaded with explosives back to the base and have dismantled the bomb. The controlled dets are when they go out to the middle of no where but yet still on the base and blow up the pieces of this bomb. When they do this there is an announcement over the base giant voice (PA system) that there will be a controlled det in 5 minutes. That way we know it's not something else. Since they usually set them off about a mile north of our office we usually go out to our parking lot to watch the explosion, cheap entertainment.

They have been doing controlled dets for this large bomb over the last two days, 10 or 12 a day. They are sizable blasts, we can feel the concussion and it rattles the doors/windows on our buildings. The blasts yesterday were big enough they shook the dust and loose paint off my ceiling in my room. When I came back to the room, there was all kinds of small paint chips and dust on my bed and desk.

Speaking of the ceiling in my room, this is a picture of it. The blocks lined up between the steel beams are flat bricks about 2" thick. They are just set in between the steel and then they pour a concrete roof on top of them (with a rubber membrane between the bricks and concrete). It's supposed to be able to withstand an impact from a rocket. We have our doubts. We kind of joke about the ceilings and what would happen if one of those bricks cracked and fell out. Now I lie in bed at night and before I fall asleep I think about those bricks, 8 feet above me and I look for cracks or chips. Seeing all that crap on my bed yesterday doesn't make me feel any better, especially since that was the result of a blast that was over a mile away.

I had to throw this picture in just because I see something new every week with the paving contractor. They were paving through an intersection the other day and the paver isn't wide enough to do the full width, so they were doing it in two passes. Normally, at home this would be a straight line between the passes, but here, whatever works. I don't know maybe the guy driving the paver snuck a little something extra in with his lunch. However, I'll give them credit, when it was all done, it looks OK.