Breaking: Apparent terrorist attack in Madrid airport

Cylinder · 30th December 2006, 01:39 AM

CNN International is reporting at least one large explosion in Madrid International Airport terminal.

Cylinder · 30th December 2006, 01:50 AM

The car bomb was placed in Terminal 4 and the plotters gave 1-hour notice which sounds more like ETA-style tactics rather than al Qaeda.

ChrisC · 30th December 2006, 01:54 AM

CNN is reporting, or rather not reporting any injuries at this point, thankfully.

Cylinder · 30th December 2006, 02:06 AM

Car bomb blasts Madrid airport

Quote:

A powerful explosion apparently caused by a car bomb caused extensive damage to Spain's busiest airport Saturday, police said, but there were no reports of casualties.

The explosion after 0800 GMT followed a warning to police, who were able to evacuate part of Madrid's Barajas International Airport.

Witnesses described a huge column of smoke billowing out from the scene of the blast.

Samantha Graham, an employee of CNN's parent company who was in an airport concourse for a flight, said hundreds of people evacuated the terminal through jetways and have gathered outside on the airport tarmac.

Hutch · 30th December 2006, 06:47 AM

Originally Posted by Cylinder

The car bomb was placed in Terminal 4 and the plotters gave 1-hour notice which sounds more like ETA-style tactics rather than al Qaeda.

The Spanish seem to be agreeing with you, they are blaming ETA. Al-Queda attacks tend to be without warning and designed to cause loss of life.

Wonder if this is a resumption of ETA terror, or just a "message" to the Spanish Government to pay more attention to it...

WildCat · 30th December 2006, 10:06 AM

I wonder if the Spanish will now withdraw from Spain?

Darth Rotor · 30th December 2006, 03:57 PM

Originally Posted by WildCat

I wonder if the Spanish will now withdraw from Spain?

That isn't what ETA is asking them to do, nor has it ever asked for that.

Or course, the Spanish Government could do just that, as a piece of brinksmanship, and posit to ETA "OK, if you are so damned smart, you try and run this nuthouse!"

DR

Cylinder · 30th December 2006, 05:02 PM

Originally Posted by Darth Rotor

That isn't what ETA is asking them to do, nor has it ever asked for that.

Sure it is - at least the northern part which the ETA considers the Basque homeland.

Merko · 30th December 2006, 05:05 PM

The Spanish government has apparently been in some very careful negiotiations with some ETA-types (staged in an undisclosed country). It seems somone doesn't like this idea. Let's hope it's some fringe fringe, like that 'real IRA'.

Darth Rotor · 30th December 2006, 05:36 PM

Originally Posted by Cylinder

Sure it is - at least the northern part which the ETA considers the Basque homeland.

That was my point. Not Spain, but the land of the Basques, which is a rather small place, eh?

DR

fuelair · 30th December 2006, 05:41 PM

Originally Posted by Darth Rotor

That was my point. Not Spain, but the land of the Basques, which is a rather small place, eh?

DR

Just pure curiousity. Do you support the Basque seperatists? Not asking about ETA or other terrorists just to verify.

Darth Rotor · 2nd January 2007, 08:30 AM

Originally Posted by fuelair

Just pure curiousity. Do you support the Basque seperatists? Not asking about ETA or other terrorists just to verify.

I find the Basques a fascinating people, but I don't care one way or the other about their separatist movement. I understand their sense of group identity. I see the larger Basque situation as a joint French-Spanish matter. I don't think that only the Spanish are on tap for the answer.

My real beef with the Basque matter has to do with FMS, and the decision by Spain to buy from Eurocopter (Puma) in the 90's, rather than the Sikorsky Blackhawk, based on a competitive win by Blackhawk (in all performance metrics), but tainted by a timely release of certain ETA operatives to Spain by France just as the decision was being made in Madrid's governmental halls.

Not the Basque's fault, but something that I wish had been better publicized.

DR

Cylinder · 3rd January 2007, 04:23 PM

Body Found in Airport Wreckage

Quote:

Rescue workers Wednesday found the remains of a man in the rubble of last weekend's Madrid airport blast, making him the first fatality in more than three years in an attack by the Basque separatist group ETA, the Interior Ministry told CNN.

The remains of Ecuadorean immigrant Carlos Alonso Palate were located in a car in the heavily damaged parking garage at Madrid Barajas Airport's Terminal 4, where an ETA van bomb exploded Saturday. They had not yet been removed.

The Socialist government Tuesday said the blast "broke, finished and liquidated" a nine-month-old cease-fire that ETA last March had promised would be "permanent," raising hopes for an end to nearly 40 years of ETA attacks blamed for more than 800 deaths and thousands of injuries.

Palate, in his mid-30s, had remained in his car, apparently sleeping, Saturday while a companion went inside the terminal to pick up someone arriving on a flight.

The interior minister on Saturday said authorities received three warning calls, including one in the name of ETA, before the blast at 9 a.m. The caller described the garage location and the van that contained the powerful bomb. Police rushed to clear the area and initially only about 20 people reported slight injuries after the blast, such as hearing problems.

But Palate and another Ecuadorean immigrant, Diego Armando Estacio, 19 -- who had also remained, separately, in his car in the garage -- were reported as missing by their family members hours after the attack.

The second missing man was still being sought. Authorities said there was little chance of finding him alive, given the huge blast and the ensuring fire at the airport garage, which caved in.

Cylinder · 5th January 2007, 05:09 AM

Body of second bomb victim recovered

Quote:

Spanish rescuers have found the body of a second man under the rubble left by Saturday's huge car bomb blast at Madrid airport, officials have said.

The body is believed to be that of a 19-year-old Ecuadorean immigrant.

The body of another Ecuadorean man was found on Wednesday. Both victims were buried under tons of rubble from the airport's multi-storey car park.

Cylinder · 5th January 2007, 05:51 AM

Police discover new bomb

Quote:

Police found a bomb in the Basque region of Spain yesterday, five days after a car bombing in Madrid killed one person and shattered a nine-month ceasefire between the government and the armed separatist group Eta.

Nearly 100kg (220lb) of explosives were found in a drum near an abandoned car outside the town of Amorebieta, and they had been rigged to be used in an attack, a spokesman for the Basque police said.

Darth Rotor · 5th January 2007, 07:24 AM

Originally Posted by Cylinder

Police discover new bomb

A VBIED, by any other name, still goes "boom!"

DR

30th December 2006, 01:39 AM	#1
Cylinder Graduate Poster Join Date: Jun 2005 Location: Arkansas Posts: 1,984	Breaking: Apparent terrorist attack in Madrid airport CNN International is reporting at least one large explosion in Madrid International Airport terminal.
	__________________ If you will not fight for the right when you can easily win without bloodshed ; if you will not fight when your victory will be sure and not too costly; you may come to the moment when you will have to fight with all the odds against you and only a precarious chance of survival. There may even be a worse case. You may have to fight when there is no hope of victory, because it is better to perish than live as slaves. - Winston Churchill, The Gathering Storm

30th December 2006, 01:50 AM	#2
Cylinder Graduate Poster Join Date: Jun 2005 Location: Arkansas Posts: 1,984	The car bomb was placed in Terminal 4 and the plotters gave 1-hour notice which sounds more like ETA-style tactics rather than al Qaeda.
	__________________ If you will not fight for the right when you can easily win without bloodshed ; if you will not fight when your victory will be sure and not too costly; you may come to the moment when you will have to fight with all the odds against you and only a precarious chance of survival. There may even be a worse case. You may have to fight when there is no hope of victory, because it is better to perish than live as slaves. - Winston Churchill, The Gathering Storm Last edited by Cylinder; 30th December 2006 at 02:00 AM. Reason: Fixed sentence before The Grammar Nazis showed up.

30th December 2006, 02:06 AM	#4
Cylinder Graduate Poster Join Date: Jun 2005 Location: Arkansas Posts: 1,984	Car bomb blasts Madrid airport Quote: A powerful explosion apparently caused by a car bomb caused extensive damage to Spain's busiest airport Saturday, police said, but there were no reports of casualties. The explosion after 0800 GMT followed a warning to police, who were able to evacuate part of Madrid's Barajas International Airport. Witnesses described a huge column of smoke billowing out from the scene of the blast. Samantha Graham, an employee of CNN's parent company who was in an airport concourse for a flight, said hundreds of people evacuated the terminal through jetways and have gathered outside on the airport tarmac.
	__________________ If you will not fight for the right when you can easily win without bloodshed ; if you will not fight when your victory will be sure and not too costly; you may come to the moment when you will have to fight with all the odds against you and only a precarious chance of survival. There may even be a worse case. You may have to fight when there is no hope of victory, because it is better to perish than live as slaves. - Winston Churchill, The Gathering Storm

30th December 2006, 06:47 AM	#5
Hutch International Arms Merchant and rollercoaster junkie Join Date: Dec 2003 Location: About 7 Miles from the Saturn 5B Posts: 5,586	Originally Posted by Cylinder The car bomb was placed in Terminal 4 and the plotters gave 1-hour notice which sounds more like ETA-style tactics rather than al Qaeda. The Spanish seem to be agreeing with you, they are blaming ETA. Al-Queda attacks tend to be without warning and designed to cause loss of life. Wonder if this is a resumption of ETA terror, or just a "message" to the Spanish Government to pay more attention to it...
	__________________ Y'all got on this boat for different reasons, but y'all come to the same place. So now I'm asking more of you than I have before. Maybe all. Sure as I know anything, I know this - they will try again. Maybe on another world, maybe on this very ground swept clean. A year from now, ten? They'll swing back to the belief that they can make people... better. And I do not hold to that. So no more runnin'. I aim to misbehave. Mal, Captain of the Serenity

30th December 2006, 10:06 AM	#6
WildCat NWO Master Conspirator Join Date: Mar 2003 Location: Albany Park, Chicago Posts: 23,587	I wonder if the Spanish will now withdraw from Spain?
	__________________ "My opinion is not uninformed there are just many things I have no clue about." -atavisms "Iran DOES have the right and good reason to attack Israel." -parky76

30th December 2006, 01:54 AM	#3
ChrisC Critical Thinker Join Date: Dec 2005 Location: BC, Canada Posts: 341	CNN is reporting, or rather not reporting any injuries at this point, thankfully.

30th December 2006, 03:57 PM	#7
Darth Rotor Salted Sith Cynic Join Date: Aug 2006 Location: Rat cheer Posts: 24,997	Originally Posted by WildCat I wonder if the Spanish will now withdraw from Spain? That isn't what ETA is asking them to do, nor has it ever asked for that. Or course, the Spanish Government could do just that, as a piece of brinksmanship, and posit to ETA "OK, if you are so damned smart, you try and run this nuthouse!" DR
	__________________ Helicopters don't so much fly as beat the air into submission. "Jesus wept, but did He laugh?"--F.H. Buckley____"There is some one thing that was too great for God to show us when He walked upon our earth ... His mirth." --Chesterton____"Atheism is no safeguard against stupidity."--The Atheist____If the barbarian in us is excised, so is our humanity."--D'rok____ "Your onus is aimed in the wrong direction." -- Cleon

30th December 2006, 05:02 PM	#8
Cylinder Graduate Poster Join Date: Jun 2005 Location: Arkansas Posts: 1,984	Originally Posted by Darth Rotor That isn't what ETA is asking them to do, nor has it ever asked for that. Sure it is - at least the northern part which the ETA considers the Basque homeland.
	__________________ If you will not fight for the right when you can easily win without bloodshed ; if you will not fight when your victory will be sure and not too costly; you may come to the moment when you will have to fight with all the odds against you and only a precarious chance of survival. There may even be a worse case. You may have to fight when there is no hope of victory, because it is better to perish than live as slaves. - Winston Churchill, The Gathering Storm

30th December 2006, 05:05 PM	#9
Merko Graduate Poster Join Date: Nov 2006 Posts: 1,250	The Spanish government has apparently been in some very careful negiotiations with some ETA-types (staged in an undisclosed country). It seems somone doesn't like this idea. Let's hope it's some fringe fringe, like that 'real IRA'.
Merko Graduate Poster Join Date: Nov 2006 Posts: 1,250

30th December 2006, 05:36 PM	#10
Darth Rotor Salted Sith Cynic Join Date: Aug 2006 Location: Rat cheer Posts: 24,997	Originally Posted by Cylinder Sure it is - at least the northern part which the ETA considers the Basque homeland. That was my point. Not Spain, but the land of the Basques, which is a rather small place, eh? DR
	__________________ Helicopters don't so much fly as beat the air into submission. "Jesus wept, but did He laugh?"--F.H. Buckley____"There is some one thing that was too great for God to show us when He walked upon our earth ... His mirth." --Chesterton____"Atheism is no safeguard against stupidity."--The Atheist____If the barbarian in us is excised, so is our humanity."--D'rok____ "Your onus is aimed in the wrong direction." -- Cleon

30th December 2006, 05:41 PM	#11
fuelair Cythraul Enfys Join Date: May 2006 Posts: 15,891	Originally Posted by Darth Rotor That was my point. Not Spain, but the land of the Basques, which is a rather small place, eh? DR Just pure curiousity. Do you support the Basque seperatists? Not asking about ETA or other terrorists just to verify.
fuelair Cythraul Enfys Join Date: May 2006 Posts: 15,891

2nd January 2007, 08:30 AM	#12
Darth Rotor Salted Sith Cynic Join Date: Aug 2006 Location: Rat cheer Posts: 24,997	Originally Posted by fuelair Just pure curiousity. Do you support the Basque seperatists? Not asking about ETA or other terrorists just to verify. I find the Basques a fascinating people, but I don't care one way or the other about their separatist movement. I understand their sense of group identity. I see the larger Basque situation as a joint French-Spanish matter. I don't think that only the Spanish are on tap for the answer. My real beef with the Basque matter has to do with FMS, and the decision by Spain to buy from Eurocopter (Puma) in the 90's, rather than the Sikorsky Blackhawk, based on a competitive win by Blackhawk (in all performance metrics), but tainted by a timely release of certain ETA operatives to Spain by France just as the decision was being made in Madrid's governmental halls. Not the Basque's fault, but something that I wish had been better publicized. DR
	__________________ Helicopters don't so much fly as beat the air into submission. "Jesus wept, but did He laugh?"--F.H. Buckley____"There is some one thing that was too great for God to show us when He walked upon our earth ... His mirth." --Chesterton____"Atheism is no safeguard against stupidity."--The Atheist____If the barbarian in us is excised, so is our humanity."--D'rok____ "Your onus is aimed in the wrong direction." -- Cleon

3rd January 2007, 04:23 PM	#13
Cylinder Graduate Poster Join Date: Jun 2005 Location: Arkansas Posts: 1,984	Body Found in Airport Wreckage Quote: Rescue workers Wednesday found the remains of a man in the rubble of last weekend's Madrid airport blast, making him the first fatality in more than three years in an attack by the Basque separatist group ETA, the Interior Ministry told CNN. The remains of Ecuadorean immigrant Carlos Alonso Palate were located in a car in the heavily damaged parking garage at Madrid Barajas Airport's Terminal 4, where an ETA van bomb exploded Saturday. They had not yet been removed. The Socialist government Tuesday said the blast "broke, finished and liquidated" a nine-month-old cease-fire that ETA last March had promised would be "permanent," raising hopes for an end to nearly 40 years of ETA attacks blamed for more than 800 deaths and thousands of injuries. Palate, in his mid-30s, had remained in his car, apparently sleeping, Saturday while a companion went inside the terminal to pick up someone arriving on a flight. The interior minister on Saturday said authorities received three warning calls, including one in the name of ETA, before the blast at 9 a.m. The caller described the garage location and the van that contained the powerful bomb. Police rushed to clear the area and initially only about 20 people reported slight injuries after the blast, such as hearing problems. But Palate and another Ecuadorean immigrant, Diego Armando Estacio, 19 -- who had also remained, separately, in his car in the garage -- were reported as missing by their family members hours after the attack. The second missing man was still being sought. Authorities said there was little chance of finding him alive, given the huge blast and the ensuring fire at the airport garage, which caved in.
	__________________ If you will not fight for the right when you can easily win without bloodshed ; if you will not fight when your victory will be sure and not too costly; you may come to the moment when you will have to fight with all the odds against you and only a precarious chance of survival. There may even be a worse case. You may have to fight when there is no hope of victory, because it is better to perish than live as slaves. - Winston Churchill, The Gathering Storm

5th January 2007, 05:09 AM	#14
Cylinder Graduate Poster Join Date: Jun 2005 Location: Arkansas Posts: 1,984	Body of second bomb victim recovered Quote: Spanish rescuers have found the body of a second man under the rubble left by Saturday's huge car bomb blast at Madrid airport, officials have said. The body is believed to be that of a 19-year-old Ecuadorean immigrant. The body of another Ecuadorean man was found on Wednesday. Both victims were buried under tons of rubble from the airport's multi-storey car park.
	__________________ If you will not fight for the right when you can easily win without bloodshed ; if you will not fight when your victory will be sure and not too costly; you may come to the moment when you will have to fight with all the odds against you and only a precarious chance of survival. There may even be a worse case. You may have to fight when there is no hope of victory, because it is better to perish than live as slaves. - Winston Churchill, The Gathering Storm

5th January 2007, 05:51 AM	#15
Cylinder Graduate Poster Join Date: Jun 2005 Location: Arkansas Posts: 1,984	Police discover new bomb Quote: Police found a bomb in the Basque region of Spain yesterday, five days after a car bombing in Madrid killed one person and shattered a nine-month ceasefire between the government and the armed separatist group Eta. Nearly 100kg (220lb) of explosives were found in a drum near an abandoned car outside the town of Amorebieta, and they had been rigged to be used in an attack, a spokesman for the Basque police said.
	__________________ If you will not fight for the right when you can easily win without bloodshed ; if you will not fight when your victory will be sure and not too costly; you may come to the moment when you will have to fight with all the odds against you and only a precarious chance of survival. There may even be a worse case. You may have to fight when there is no hope of victory, because it is better to perish than live as slaves. - Winston Churchill, The Gathering Storm

5th January 2007, 07:24 AM	#16
Darth Rotor Salted Sith Cynic Join Date: Aug 2006 Location: Rat cheer Posts: 24,997	Originally Posted by Cylinder Police discover new bomb A VBIED, by any other name, still goes "boom!" DR
	__________________ Helicopters don't so much fly as beat the air into submission. "Jesus wept, but did He laugh?"--F.H. Buckley____"There is some one thing that was too great for God to show us when He walked upon our earth ... His mirth." --Chesterton____"Atheism is no safeguard against stupidity."--The Atheist____If the barbarian in us is excised, so is our humanity."--D'rok____ "Your onus is aimed in the wrong direction." -- Cleon