September 9, 2016
Under the searing sun on the Mediterranean shoreline, Libyan military engineers carefully stack ageing 155mm shells – currently one of the Islamic State (IS) group’s most frequently used IEDs, left cunningly rigged to door handles, window fastenings and ordinary household objects.
Between the shells, disposal experts laid other explosives – mortar grenade heads found packed into tyres, detonation devices, small missiles and even two handmade IS suicide belts stripped from dead militants who were killed before they could blow themselves up.
“These suicide belts are filled with some kind of handmade explosive but we don’t actually know what it even is. We have never seen this type of stuff before,” Commander Mohammed Torjiman told Middle East Eye, pointing to the sliced-open packages of white and yellow powder taped to the belts which would have been detonated with a grenade component. “Once the grenade pin is pulled, these belts detonate within six seconds,” he said.
The engineers have cleared Sirte of some 5,000 improvised explosive devices (IEDs), booby traps and mines laid by IS, and this week they detonated 10 tonnes of explosives in a controlled blast carried out with no international assistance.
The de-miners packed semtex into the tips of shells and ran cables between the two piles which were partially buried in the sand to contain the blast. They drove to a safe distance of one-and-a-half kilometres to conduct the detonation.
The massive blast was heard and felt across Sirte. Unsuspecting groups of Libyan fighters threw themselves to the ground, fearing the explosion was yet another suicide car bomb, which IS is now using on almost a daily basis in their final defence of Sirte – the town they had claimed as their Mediterranean stronghold for more than a year.
“This is the fourth major controlled explosion we have conducted since the fight against IS began four months ago and, containing more than 200 munitions, this is our biggest yet,” said Commander Torjiman, overseeing the remote detonation in sand dunes on the outskirts of Sirte. “We have deactivated more than 5,000 IEDs and mines in the past four months and this explosion is a moment of satisfaction because by destroying these items, we know we have saved lives.”
His military engineering team, one of three units currently undertaking de-mining operations in Sirte, spent seven hours preparing the IEDs for detonation.