Chance Discovery 01 Explosives Shipment

Northern Advocate, 5 January 1948, Page 3

Chance Discovery 01 Explosives Shipment

NEW YORK, Sun. (10 a.m.) Sev-enty-seven cases containing in all 184,8001 b of TNT and machinery were recovered on a Jersey City pier where they were being loaded on the vessel Executor. The cases were consigned to points in Palestine. The police said there were enough explosives “to blow five Jersey cities to bits.”

Only 26 of the cases contained explosives. The other 51 cases contained machinery which the Federal Bureau of Investigation felt could be used to manufacture arms. The cases were consigned as “used industrial machinery” to Haborg, Limited, Tel Aviv, and to the Palestine Glass Works and Phoenicia, Limited, both at Haifa. The explosives were discovered while they were being loaded. CASE DROPPED Eleven cases had been put on board the Executor but the twelfth was dropped and broke. A cooper sent to repair the case found the TNT. The stevedore in charge notified the police, who immediately closed the pier and ordered the 700 men loading' the Executor and three other ships to leave immediately.

The police then opened the cases and, finding that 26 contained the same quantity of TNT, had them loaded on a barge, which took them to the Government munitions depot at Gravesend Bay. The police said the explosives had no detonators but each box contained a paper bearing directions how to attach detonators to the cans. There was little doubt that the explosives were intended for use in the war between the Jews and Arabs. TWO SHIPPERS Mr Frank Laughlin, assistant port collector of the United States Customs, said there were two shippers of the seized TNT. One lot was credited to the Oved Trading Company, 147 West 42nd Street, New York City, and the other to the Martich Export Corporation. 152 West 42nd Street. Three hours after the seizure police raided a three-storey warehouse in Manhattan.

They found a quantity of military material, including devices for loading a 0.3 calibre rifle, cartridges, several radio and field telephone outfits and miscellaneous army equipment and spare parts.