northen ireland troubles should called the forgotton war becuase know one rembers the horrors that soldiers faced

18th May 1973 Knock-na-Moe Castle Hotel Murders.
The Hotel stands in its own extensive grounds in the countryside on the outskirts of Omagh. A large neo gothic structure, it looks as if it was converted to a hotel from a substantial country house. The hotel was popular across the religious divide and every Friday night a dance was held. On the night of Friday the 18th of May, five army pilots attended the dance, from the helicopter squadron at Lisanelly camp in Omagh.
In the early hours in the following morning when the dance finished the five climbed into there car in the car park having had a good night out.
The car exploded as it started to move away. Sergeants, Derek Reed, Barrie Cox, Sheriden Young and Fred Drake, where killed instantly. The fifth man who was driving the car died in hospital a few days later. A fifty-pound booby trap bomb had been placed under the car during the course of the evening.

It was the start of my first day in Ireland having arrived at Omagh the previous afternoon. I was told that there was an incident and that men were needed to collect evidence at the scene. It wasn’t my job but I might as well get stuck into the tour, so I went. On arrival at the hotel I was told that the bodies had been removed, (the bits that they could find anyway). I spent the remainder of this inauspicious day collecting fragments of car, clothing and people in a bin liner. I suppose it should have told me something about the next eighteen months.

1973 Knock-na-Moe Castle Hotel 2 (a few weeks after above) [see photos]
A suspicious car was found in the car park of the hotel, Ron Becket our ATO and his team, where called to the scene. As usual I was with them. There were a number of cars parked in front of the Hotel and it didn’t take long to detect were the stench of ANFO was coming from. A dark coloured car quite close to the Hotel entrance. Ron wanted some photographs of the scene before getting stuck in. So I took some shots from the car park and then, at Ron’s suggestion, climbed a fire escape onto the roof of the hotel, in order that I could position myself directly above the suspect car, for more photographs.
Ron decided to disrupt the bomb by means of a “segmented plate”.
If you can imagine a light stand holding a vertical steel plate. The front of the plate has a kind of frame on it. There is a sandwich of plastic explosive and one inch thick segmented steel plate, resting in the frame. The idea is that the frame is propped against the area of the car where the bomb is. On detonation the steel backing plate allows the explosive force to travel in only one direction, carrying the segmented plate with it. The effect is similar to a giant shotgun being fired at the car from very close range. The segments of the steel plate drive through the bodywork of the car, disrupting the timing mechanism and detonator of the bomb within, in passing. That is the theory anyway.
On this occasion it worked without setting of an explosion in the car. With the help of the fire brigades high-pressure hoses, the remaining explosive was washed out of the car safely. The bomb was calculated to be a three hundred pounder.