Breaking the bomb with 'swords'

The US military uses equipment capable of producing high-pressure jet to shred everything inside the bomb.

A US soldier uses Stingray to disable homemade bombs in Afghanistan.
(Photo: TheSun).

Discovery said the US National Sandia Laboratory used water and explosives to make a bomb-disposal device called the Stingray. 3,000 Stingray devices have been brought to Afghanistan to help US troops dispose of homemade bombs (IEDs). The US Department of Defense recognizes that homemade roadside bombs are the biggest threat to their troops in Afghanistan.

If bombs or mines explode, the pressure that they produce causes the surrounding air to expand drastically in all directions. Stingray is designed to create extreme pressure in one direction. This pressure turns more than 1,000 grams of water into a ' water blade ' capable of dealing damage.

When detonated, the ' water ' will penetrate the outer shell of the IED. Although the shell is made of metal, wood or plastic, water is still through it. Then the ' blade ' cuts the wire, detonator, and everything inside the bomb into small pieces that can not explode.

" Sword water is an extremely effective tool to disable IEDs because it is capable of penetrating very deep. It's like we bombed a bomb with a solid and sharp knife , "said Greg Scharrer, an expert at the Sandia National Laboratory.

Scharrer says Stingray's biggest advantage over other bomb-destroyers is that it disables the bombs without ever detonating them. In addition, they can control robots to bomb with Stingray.

" This is a great device, because it only needs a very small amount of water and explosives to break the bomb ," said Jimmie Oxley, a University of Rhode Island scientist.