PHOTOS: Four milk jugs filled with gasoline were wrapped in detonation cord outside a Las Vegas Fire Department training center on Wednesday.
Bomb Squad technician Mark Duncan yelled “fire in the hole!” three times.
A loud bang sent a fireball about 10 feet into the air of the eastern valley and a large plume of black smoke even higher into the clear desert sky. Duncan said the explosive weight of the blast, part of a media demonstration, was the equivalent 0.11 pounds of TNT.
Cmdr. Shon Saucedo said team members wear two hats. The unit investigates arsons within Las Vegas city limits, but also serves as the bomb squad for all of Southern Nevada.
“We’re the law enforcement wing of Las Vegas Fire Rescue,” Saucedo said. The squad has two bomb response trucks. From inside, team members can remotely control robots and conduct X-rays of possible explosive packages, Capt. Jamie Sypniewicz said. The screens in the truck displayed an example of an X-ray of a pipe bomb in a bag.