A
homemade bomb blew up at a FedEx Corp distribution center early on
Tuesday injuring one person, officials said, the fifth explosion in the
state this month. It was bound for Austin, the site of four other
bombings.
Officials
did not say if they believed the device, which exploded at the FedEx
facility near San Antonio, was the work of a "serial bomber" who police
feared may be responsible for the four earlier devices, which killed two
people and injured six others.
The
first three were parcel bombs left on residential doorsteps, while the
fourth on Sunday was apparently set off by a trip wire. Police warned
that the latest bomb had a more sophisticated design than the others.
The
package exploded shortly after midnight local time (0500 GMT) at a
distribution facility in Schertz, Texas, outside San Antonio, about 65
miles (105 km) south of Austin, the San Antonio Fire Department said on
Twitter.
Agents
from the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Bureau of Alcohol,
Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives were on the scene and investigating,
fire officials said. They did not give the address for the package.
"We
are investigating it as being possibly related to our open
investigation," FBI spokeswoman Michelle Lee told the Austin
American-Statesman newspaper. "We can´t know for sure until we have an
opportunity to look at the evidence itself."
The
wounded employee, who was not identified, was taken to a hospital with
injuries that officials described as non life-threatening. About 75
people were working at the facility at the time, fire officials said.
Police
did not immediately say if the explosion appeared to be linked to the
four others. The first three were parcel bombs dropped off in front of
homes on Austin's east side, with the fourth an apparent trip wire
device that went off on the city's west side on Sunday.
The four devices were similar in construction, suggesting they were the work of the same bomb maker, officials said.
FedEx officials could not be reached immediately comment.
The
first two bombs killed black men and investigators believed that the
third, which injured a Latina woman, may have been intended for a black
family's home, police said, raising the possibility they were a hate
crime.
Sunday's
trip wire bomb, which injured two white men, went off shortly after
police made a rare public call to the suspect to explain his motives.
Reuters
0 comments:
Post a Comment