A Law Enforcement and Security Officers' Guide to Responding to Bomb Threats Providing a Working Knowledge of Bombs, Preparing for Such Incidents, and Performing Basic Analysis of Potential Threats

This expanded new edition continues to demonstrate that all law enforcement and security officers should have a working knowledge of bombs, explosives, suspicious devices, chemical-biological-radiological incidents and other threats for their own protection. A lack of this working knowledge can be a contributing factor to injury, death, or the inability to mitigate these incidents. The text points out, in a clear and concise format, the critical steps that should be taken by the first arriving personnel in order to allow the general law enforcement and security practitioner to respond to such incidents. Chapter topics include the basic techniques for risk assessment, target and hazard identification, the common methods of bomb delivery, bomb construction and methods of triggering. Letter bombs, vehicle bombs, and high-risk facilities such as aircraft, airports, medical facilities and schools are examined. Countermeasures and defensive efforts are addressed in sufficient detail to allow the public safety, law enforcement and security professional to make recommendations and to assess any actions taken. One feature of the book is that it shows the practitioner how to perform basic threat analysis of potential threats by groups or persons. A section with protocols for emergency medical service personnel in treating those injured from blast, overpressure, shrapnel or chemical agents, as well as the resources that need to be identified along with a model bomb threat plan is included. Initial actions to be taken following an explosion and how to protect evidence is also discussed. Information is included on the threat of clandestine drug laboratories and the techniques to recognize the requisite signatures of such facilities. Of particular interest is the new material on the changing nature of bomb construction, targets and risk assessment, response to explosions and chemical, and biological and radiological devices. The reader will be able to use the information in this book as a general guide and develop local protocols to meet these incidents. This guide will be useful to all those in security and law enforcement in identifying suspect items and taking appropriate action until the bomb squad arrives.