Good for the Irish, at last.Well, "high-density uranium warheads" implies Depleted Uranium (DU), one would think. And the following:
A leading independent weapons expert has warned the weapons cargos pose a major risk to Prestwick Airport. 'These are the most horrendously powerful non-nuclear weapons on earth,' said Dai Williams, who has been investigating the new generation of hard target 'bunker buster' bombs.
'In the worst-case hazard assessment, an accident involving one of those flights would leave an unquenchable fire burning on the runway for a week and a large uranium cloud drifting over southern Scotland'
would appear to imply the same.
As regards the
GBU-28 bunker-buster, if this is what is referred to, though this article doesn't say, a "special weapon developed for penetrating hardened Iraqi command centers located deep underground," we see that it originally used the
BLU-113 Penetrator Warhead, with a case made from HP9420 alloy steel to provide target penetration capabilities. This warhead was updated and replaced by the
BLU-122 Penetrator Warhead, details of the penetrating case of which are not generally provided, but which is said to "significantly improve upon the performance of the BLU-113 warhead by incorporating the latest technological advances in warhead designs and explosives, {since} the new warhead incorporates design improvements to improve its insensitive munition performance."
We do, however, have available to us the following Scoop/Coalition For Free Thought In Media piece from May 2003
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/HL0305/S00050.htmU.S. Colonel Admits 500 Tons of D.U. Were Used in IraqBy Jay Shaft
Coalition For Free Thought In Media
5 May 2003
In three separate interviews a U.S. Special Operations Command Colonel admitted that the U.S. and Great Britain fired 500 tons of D.U. munitions into Iraq.
He has also informed me that
the G.B.U.-28 BLU 113 Penetrator Bunker Buster 5000 pound bomb contains D.U. in the warhead. Until now, as far as I know, the materials used to make the warhead of the G.B.U-28 have remained shrouded in mystery.
<snip>
J.S.: Hold on here, I didn't know that the Bunker Busters were D.U. How do you know that? I have to make sure this is for real.
U.S.C.: Well the specs on the B.B.s are top secret, so good luck on verifying it. To answer your question I will ask you one. How do you think they can penetrate a steel hardened bunker with a bomb unit? There has to be D.U. in the warhead or else you wouldn't get the penetration of the target that is buried underground.
J.S.: Oh I see your point. Well can you tell me which of the B.B.s have D.U. warheads?
U.S.C.: Well.......... (long pause) I think I will tell you about one and leave it at that. The G.B.U.-28(guided bomb unit) BLU 113B 5000 pounder is capable of being fitted with a D.U. warhead and dropped. It is not solely a D.U. warhead; they still use them with conventional non-D.U. warheads.
If you were watching T.V. and you saw any bombs hit there was an easy way to tell if it was D.U.
If you saw all those little secondary white fires burning in the air in the blast: that was D.U. burning off. D.U. burns with a whitish orange flame, almost looks like a firework shell burning.
J.S.: Any other B.B.'s using D.U. warheads?
U.S.C.: I don't think I'll answer that, I've already said too much. Next question!
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