Piece of Paper in Car Bomb Saves Life of Naval Officer

A thin piece of paper failed to dislodge itself from two contact points on a sophisticated, powerful bomb rigged to the door of a Navy officer’s car early today, saving the man’s life, Long Beach police said.

The officer, commander of a ship docked in Long Beach Harbor, opened the door to the car parked by an apartment building in the 2100 block of East 1st Street and saw the device on the ground beneath the vehicle, Lt. Jim Reed said.

About 200 people living in the complex and surrounding homes evacuated the area about 5:40 a.m., Reed said.

Sheriff’s Department bomb experts put the bomb in a special container and trucked it to a beach parking lot at Junipero Avenue, where they were expected to destroy the device, he said.

The bomb, an apparently sophisticated contraption fashioned with two wires, a nine-volt battery and an untold quantity of explosives, was triggered to explode when the car door was pulled open, Reed said.

The device failed because a thin slip of paper, which was part of the bomb’s construction, did not fully dislodge itself when the door was opened, preventing two contact points from coming together, Reed said.

“That piece of paper saved his life,” Reed said.

Neither the officer nor his ship were immediately identified.