New Delhi, Nov 15 A day after the massive accidental blast inside Nowgam Police Station in Srinagar, defence expert Captain Anil Gaur (Retd.) termed the tragedy a grave case of mishandling during explosive examination, warning that even a small lapse can trigger catastrophic consequences when sensitive materials are being processed.
“This is a very unfortunate incident. I would say that nine of our personnel have lost their lives and around 27 police personnel who were present at the station were injured... It is being said that a detonator accidentally went off in someone’s hand...” Captain Gaur told IANS.
Explaining the likely chain of events, he added that explosive teams had been examining and sampling the recovered explosives and arms for the past two days, and a single mistake can trigger a fatal blast.
He said, “It seems the detonators must have slipped from someone’s hand, which caused the explosion. Ammonium nitrate is not an explosive substance until detonated. Detonators are very sensitive — when one blasts, others may catch, and when they blast, other explosives can catch fire. Handling should be done with extreme caution, and detonators should never be kept with the main explosives. Basically, it happened because of mishandling.”
Meanwhile, Jammu and Kashmir DGP Nalin Prabhat on Saturday dismissed any terror angle and called the blast an unfortunate accident. Addressing a press conference at the Police Control Room, he said some theories being circulated were “unnecessary speculation”.
The DGP explained, “A huge quantity of explosive material from Faridabad was brought to Nowgam Police Station and kept securely in open space. Due to the voluminous nature of the recovery, the sampling process of the explosive material was taking place for the last two days, yesterday and the day before, for forwarding the samples for further forensic and chemical examination.”
He added that the seized material was being handled with extreme caution because of its unstable and sensitive nature.
“Unfortunately around 11.20 pm on Friday, there was accidental explosion of the seized material. Any other further speculation into the cause of this incident is unnecessary. In this unfortunate incident, nine people have lost their lives. One personnel of the Special Investigation Agency, two revenue officers, three personnel of the FLS team, two crime branch photographers and a tailor have lost their lives.”
With investigators now focussed on technical assessment, both experts and police have emphasised that the tragedy appears to be the result of an accidental chain reaction triggered during sampling.
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