Dagger
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- Joined
- Apr 14, 2014
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Why are countries still using the fake bomb detectors sold by a convicted British conman?
Pakistani security personnel still guard Karachi's Jinnah airport using versions of Jim McCormick's phoney bomb detector. They are not alone in having a seemingly unshakeable belief in the ADE 651.
It is is one of the world's most obvious terrorist targets. So how did a group of 10 militants armed with guns, bomb vests, rocket-launchers and grenades get into Karachi's Jinnah airport? Part of the answer, incredibly, may lie in the fact that Pakistani security personnel still guard the outer perimeter using versions of the phoney bomb detector sold by the convicted British conman Jim McCormick.
McCormick's device, which he called the ADE 651, was itself a variation of a common design. Essentially, a telescopic radio aerial is attached by a hinge to a plastic handgrip. When used by a "properly trained" operator, who must first sensitise it to the "molecular frequency" of explosives, it was supposed to point out bombs by swinging towards them.
In fact, all this was nonsense. The aerial swings because of unconscious movements by the operator, known as the ideomotor effect – the same thing that gives rise to the common belief in dowsing. Nevertheless, McCormick and other fraudsters, such as Gary Bolton, exported thousands to clients around the world, including in Iraq and Pakistan. Less ambitious criminals used to sell them as golf ball detectors in the 1990s.
Source: http://www.theguardian.com/world/sh...ctors-british-conman-pakistan-karachi-airport
Pakistani security personnel still guard Karachi's Jinnah airport using versions of Jim McCormick's phoney bomb detector. They are not alone in having a seemingly unshakeable belief in the ADE 651.
It is is one of the world's most obvious terrorist targets. So how did a group of 10 militants armed with guns, bomb vests, rocket-launchers and grenades get into Karachi's Jinnah airport? Part of the answer, incredibly, may lie in the fact that Pakistani security personnel still guard the outer perimeter using versions of the phoney bomb detector sold by the convicted British conman Jim McCormick.
McCormick's device, which he called the ADE 651, was itself a variation of a common design. Essentially, a telescopic radio aerial is attached by a hinge to a plastic handgrip. When used by a "properly trained" operator, who must first sensitise it to the "molecular frequency" of explosives, it was supposed to point out bombs by swinging towards them.
In fact, all this was nonsense. The aerial swings because of unconscious movements by the operator, known as the ideomotor effect – the same thing that gives rise to the common belief in dowsing. Nevertheless, McCormick and other fraudsters, such as Gary Bolton, exported thousands to clients around the world, including in Iraq and Pakistan. Less ambitious criminals used to sell them as golf ball detectors in the 1990s.
Source: http://www.theguardian.com/world/sh...ctors-british-conman-pakistan-karachi-airport
