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Being shot at while trying to disarm a bomb – just a day at work

Source: The Guardian

Nov 08, 2009

Summary

In Afghanistan, teams of British disposal experts rely on both skill and luck to neutralise hundreds of improvised explosive devices every month

When Staff Sergeant Stevie Jack kneels in the dust of Helmand province beside a Taliban bomb, he wonders whether this could be the day when two detonator wires get blown together by an Afghan breeze.

Jack has defused more than 70 devices this year. On at least 30 missions the British bomb disposal expert has neutralised the threat while being shot at by the Taliban. "When you're down at the device, you're really just concentrating on making sure every single aspect of what you are doing is safe," he said.

The 35-year-old, an ammunition technician with the Royal Logistic Corps, is among the specialists tasked with disabling the thousands of booby traps, roadside bombs and hidden improvised explosive devices (IEDs) that litter Helmand province.

Their ubiquity and elaborate placement means IEDs are by far the biggest killer of British troops in southern Afghanistan: more than 60 UK personnel have died in Helmand from such d

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