- Vehicle explosion
A vehicle explosion is the destruction of, or damage to, a
vehicle caused by anexplosion . They may be caused by an accident or be used as a weapon.Use as a weapon
Car bomb
A car bomb is an
improvised explosive device that is placed in a car or other vehicle and then exploded. It is commonly used as a weapon ofassassination ,terrorism , orguerrilla warfare , to kill the occupant(s) of the vehicle and people near the blast site and/or to cause damage to buildings or other property. Car bombs act as their own delivery mechanisms and can carry a relatively large amount ofexplosive material without attracting suspicion.Truck s are most commonly used, althoughmotorcycle s and evenbicycle s have also been used to carry bombs. They are sometimes for asuicide attack .The earliest car bombs were intended for assassination. These were often wired to the car's
ignition system , to explode when the car was started. Ignition triggering is now rare, as it is easy to detect and hard to install – interfering with the circuitry is time-consuming andcar alarm s can be triggered by drains on the car's electrical system. Also, the target can start the car remotely (inadvertently or otherwise), or the target may be a passenger who is a safe distance away when the ignition starts. It is now more common for assassination bombs to be affixed to the underside of the car and then detonated remotely, by the car's motion, or by other means. The bomb is exploded as the target approaches or starts the vehicle or, more commonly, after the vehicle begins to move, when the target is more likely to be inside. For this reason, guards often check the underside of vehicles with a long mirror mounted on a pole.Kamikaze
Kamikaze is a word of Japanese origin, which in the
English language usually refers to suicide attacks carried out byImperial Japan 's military aviators against Allied ships towards the end of the Pacific campaign ofWorld War II , by crashing their planes intowarship s to stop and block the advancement of Allied shipping towards theJapanese archipelago . Air attacks were the predominant and best-known aspect of a wider use of – or plans for – suicide attacks by Japanese personnel, including soldiers carrying explosives, and boat crews (seeJapanese Special Attack Units ).Since the end of the war, in 1945, the word kamikaze has sometimes been used as a "
pars pro toto " for other kinds of attack in which an attacker is deliberately sacrificed. These include a variety of suicide attacks, in other historical contexts, such as the proposed use of "Selbstopfer " aircraft byNazi Germany and varioussuicide bombing s byterrorist organisations around the world, such as theSeptember 11, 2001 attacks .Car explosions in film and television
Many
film s andtelevision program s overdramatise car explosions, showing them as being far more likely than they actually are. Cars in these media frequently explode after a crash or when being hit bybullet s.ee also
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Accidents and incidents in aviation
*Catastrophic kill
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