Useless bomb detectors deployed - ADE651 and GT200

Here's the company: www.globaltechnical.co.uk...

And here's the story:

news.bbc.co.uk...

Page last updated at 15:02 GMT, Wednesday, 27 January 2010

UK warns world about useless 'bomb detectors'

By Caroline Hawley and Meirion Jones
BBC Newsnight

A UK government ban on the export of "magic wand" bomb detectors to Iraq and Afghanistan becomes effective on 27 January, as the BBC reveals further shocking evidence of the shortcomings of these devices.

The restriction is being imposed following a BBC Newsnight investigation which showed that the supposed detectors were incapable of detecting explosives or anything else.

There are concerns that they have failed to stop bomb attacks which have killed hundreds of people.

The British Foreign Office has told the BBC that they will now be urgently warning all governments who may have bought devices such as the ADE651 and GT200 that they are "wholly ineffective" at detecting bombs and explosives.

The ADE651 is made by a company from Somerset called ATSC. The director of the company, Jim McCormick, was arrested at the beginning of this month on suspicion of misrepresentation.

The GT200 is sold by Global Technical in Kent.

Global concerns

Despite advice from the British embassy in Baghdad, the ADE651 is still in use on checkpoints in Iraq, while an investigation ordered by the Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki continues.
...

The devices are also in use in Mexico, Kenya, Lebanon, Jordan and China.
...
Explosives expert Sidney Alford took apart the "black box" of the GT200, which is supposed to receive signals from the detection cards.

He was surprised at what he found.

"Speaking as a professional, I would say that is an empty plastic case," he told us.
Mr Alford also took apart a "detection card" and found there was nothing in it other than card and paper.

...

Alternative uses

The devices have also surfaced in Kenya where comedian and broadcaster Stephen Fry saw them in use by rangers when he was filming for the BBC series, Last Chance to See. Mr Fry told the BBC that he thought it was "cynical, cruel and monstrous" that rangers - who were trying to track down poachers - had been told they could detect ivory at vast distances.

"I was horrified. They had spent a vast sum of money on a modern equivalent of a hazel twig divining rod. There was no possibility that such a thing could work."

...Complete article a link

Yet more scammers in the world costing lives.

[edit on 27-1-2010 by Dbriefed]