Illegally Stored Explosives Ignited in Fire at FBI Building

06/05/01 J.D. Cash with Roger Charles

The McCurtain Daily Gazette has confirmed that in the spring of 1987, a series of explosions caused by the illegal storage of Soviet-manufactured military explosives rocked the FBI's sprawling federal complex in Washington, D.C.

Unaware of the actual nature of the catastrophe at the J. Edgar Hoover Building, the local media at the time was unable to accurately report what really happened. Buried near the back page of the Washington Post was an innocuous story reporting that a fire in a broom closet at the FBI headquarters caused the evacuation of the night shift.

Thus, for more than a dozen years, the real story of what happened at the nation's national crime center would remain buried from public scrutiny.

After a four-year Freedom of Information Act battle with the agency, the FBI has finally turned over an incredible series of reports of investigation concerning the incident at the Hoover Building.

The documents clearly implicate a number of FBI agents in the dangerous and illegal practice of storing high explosives in a public building. It was a practice that eventually resulted in the destruction of the Explosive Unit of the crime lab and risked the lives of fellow workers as well as firefighters sent to the scene.

Also outlined in the investigators' reports are facts establishing that evidence in a number of FBI investigations was cross-contaminated by the explosions.

The FBI report, made public today for the first time, concludes that a May 5, 1987, conflagration at the Hoover Building was the result of a fire and detonation of a large cache of foreign-made military explosives that were present inside that federal building.

Supplemented with some 30 photographs of the gutted offices, the report determined that at the height of the firestorm, Soviet-made rocket-propelled grenades (RPG's) and Soviet-manufactured 122-mm rocket fuses destroyed evidence in criminal investigations and threatened the lives of FBI personnel and firefighters, as missiles and shrapnel blasted through evidence cabinets and tore gaping holes in the walls of the world-famous crime lab.

Details from this 197-page report, obtained through the Freedom of Information Act, provide a step-by-step account of the disaster.

Summarizing the disaster, investigators for the FBI and ATF could not come to agreement on the catalyst that initiated the explosives. But the FBI's investigation clearly shows that agents assigned to the lab failed to follow federal law and customary safety regulations regarding the proper storage of explosive devices - thereby risking the lives of hundreds of employees in the federal building.

Contained in the FBI summary of the incident, bureau employees interviewed said that explosives at the Hoover Building began detonating around 4 a.m. EST on May 5, 1987. Firefighters summoned to the scene also reported explosions going off in the structure when they arrived.

FBI supervisors admitted to the emergency workers that there were explosives stored in the Explosives Unit of the crime lab that were in the process of detonating. Firemen were warned they would be exposed to "bomb debris, explosives, ordnance, rocket propelled grenades and a LAW rocket," the report states.

After making their way to the corridor where the crime lab was located, firefighters found the smoke so thick that one later reported in an FBI debriefing that, "He could not see numbers on the doors."

Also noted in the debriefing: as rescue personnel approached the door to the Explosive Unit, a Soviet-manufactured rocket-propelled grenade exploded, sending firemen to the floor. After the explosions stopped, firemen entered the lab area to discover a scorched shell.

Accompanying photos obtained by this newspaper clearly show that the 600-square-foot lab was largely gutted. And there was other damage.

Evidence in a number of Justice Department criminal investigations was involved, cross-contaminated by the detonation of high-explosives and the resulting fire.

The subsequent investigation conducted by FBI officials found the following:

"A visual inspection of the evidence storage room in the Explosives Unit in the FBI Laboratory revealed evidence of a fire and the observable physical characteristics which are associated with the explosion of military-type explosive ordnance. With regard to the explosion of the ordnance, the following observations were noted:

1 The floor area between the rows of evidence cabinets exhibit numerous small craters which are characteristic as having been produced from the explosion of 122-mm rocket fuses.

2 The large holes in the evidence cabinets are characteristic as having been produced from the explosion of 122-mm rocket fuses.

3 The hole through the wall is characteristic of having been produced by the explosion of a rocket-propelled grenade without the initiation of the base detonating fuse element. In essence, when the rocket hit the wall, the explosive in the warhead exploded from the force impact and not from the base fuse. The blast and fragment damage to the surrounding area and the wall were produced from this exploding rocket.

4 Evidence of high-speed missile damage is evident in some areas in the evidence room from the ceiling to floors and surrounding walls. This damage is characteristic of having been produced by metal fragments from the exploding military ordnance."

Details from the numerous interviews of FBI agents assigned to the lab produced a list of high explosives that were present in the lab when the catastrophe struck.

What follows is a partial list of high explosives that the investigators discovered had been left on the floor of the lab for months, piled in a cardboard box. Fortunately, not all these extraordinarily dangerous explosives detonated that night:

"Twenty-two pounds of plastic (C-4) explosive; five pounds of TNT; four pounds of PETN; black powder safety fuse; several six-inch strips of detonating chord."

Also stored in cabinets in the lab before the incident, investigators reported the following items - most of which did explode during the incident:

"Ten to fifteen rounds of Soviet 30mm anti-aircraft ammunition; two or three military-type grenade igniting fuses; three rocket propelled grenades; forty-five detonating fuses; forty-five Soviet MRV-1 122mm rocket fuses."

Ed Horn is director of Storage Operations for the U.S. Army's conventional ammunition facility in Crane, Ind., and an expert in the proper procedures for handling military explosives.

He told the Gazette that all military high explosives must be stored in earthen and steel reinforced concrete bunkers and segregated by type of explosives.

When provided the key details of what the FBI report found, Horn said, "All of that is absolutely crazy. No one should bring high-explosives into a federal building, much less store it there."

But according to the FBI report, this practice of storing explosives at the Hoover Building was long held. Although the special agent's name is redacted from the report, the former head of the Explosive Lab admitted to investigators that this deadly practice had been going on for quite some time.

The report quotes the agent as saying he, himself, turned over to his replacement, "…(A) box or two containing foreign explosives."

This exchange took place some five months before those same explosives were said to have been present on the floor of the lab when fire and explosions ravaged the area.

Commenting on the rationale for keeping these explosives in a federal building, the former head of the unit said he thought the explosives might make good "teaching aids."

Fortunately, the C-4 did not detonate with the rest of the explosives. Several experts contacted said that if 22 pounds of C-4 detonated that night, it would have destroyed a substantial portion of the Hoover building, risking the lives of numerous members of the night shift working in the area. A daytime explosion of a similar amount of explosives might have killed hundreds, experts speculated.

However, the FBI agent responsible for operations at the Explosive Unit at the time the incident occurred seemed little concerned and completely unaware of federal law regarding this remarkable oversight.

During an interview with FBI investigators, the supervisor of the unit readily admitted he knew there were foreign explosives in a box on the floor of the lab, but he saw nothing wrong with the practice.

"I inherited them from Special Agent (name redacted in report) when I took over…Explosives are stored in the unit only to the extent necessary to examine cases, provide terrorist intelligence information, retain referenced collections, and for training."

The report went on to say, "He considers unit practices and personnel to be safe and highly professional."

Such an explosives storage practice was rebuffed by every expert this newspaper contacted. Each stated that any work done to collect evidence from an explosive must be done at a remote location - safely away from any federal building.

Focusing on the issue of storing high-explosives in a federal building, the FBI's final report on the Hoover incident concurred, recommending that lab personnel keep only small quantities of explosives on hand when doing their work."

However, there were no recommendations found in the report that any agents should be disciplined for placing their co-workers in jeopardy or for the resulting destruction of federal property and evidence in criminal investigations.

The report also noted that the Explosive Unit did not have a "no smoking policy" nor did it employ smoke detectors or have a fire sprinkler system in place at the time of the incident.

FBI building was rocked in 1987 by explosion of stored military weapons

-- Ain't Gonna Happen (Not Here Not@ever.com), June 06, 2001

Answers

FBI agents and firemen, whose faces have been blacked out, investigate a room in the Hoover building.

-- Ain't Gonna Happen (Not Here Not@ever.com), June 06, 2001.