Irish Industrial Explosive Factory

Knarr

What is the nature of this facility/operation does anyone know? Is it contained within a barracks at Enfield? Do they manufacture explosives for the commercial sector (quarrying, mines etc) or what? I would have thought the Defence forces use 'off the shelf' explosives manufactured abroad. This facility also warrents 24/7/365 security it seems.

See here... http://www.military.ie/dfhq/pubrel/publications/annualreport/AReport03en.pdf

"Security of Key Installations

The key installations that continued to be secured by the
Defence Forces during 2003 were Government Buildings,
The Central Bank, Portlaoise Prison and Hospital, The Irish
Industrial Explosive factory at Enfield, and Dublin Docklands
(during loading and unloading of munitions on ships).
The Defence Forces carried out patrols to the following
key installations: Airports, Docklands, Prisons, Courts, RTÉ,
ESB, CIE installations, and fuel storage facilities. A total of
2,140 armed guard parties were required to secure the

installations and a further 1,156 patrols were also conducted."


And just another question. I was cycling along the Canal near Bluebell, Dublin 12 and on one side of the canal there is like an ESB station of some sort. On the corners of this facility overlooking the canal were what looked like bricked up pillboxes. Woudl this have been a military barracks in the past or what are they there for. Ill post photo's up if I ever pass it again. Might be of interest to people interested in old pillboxes.

Local-womanizer

Knarr wrote: »

Might be of interest to people interested in old pillboxes.

You wont get many Junkies on this site :pac:

As for the explosive factory,I never knew we had one.

Avgas

AFAIK it was for commercial explosives...we used to have quite a bit of mining activity in Ireland in the 1970s and early 1980s......I remember seeing their distinctive orange and blue vans always escorted by a huge 4.0 Granada special branch car front and back.....:)

The good old bad days.

xflyer

The factory at Enfield has been there for many years. When you fly over it you can see the storage areas with blast walls around them. A quick Google turned up this. http://www.iie-online.com/about-us/

Obviously their main customers would be in quarrying.

I wonder does the army still guard the RTE Kippure mast 24/7 seeing as RTE is mentioned?

As for the Bluebell pillboxes, they are probably dating from the war. it was probably a key installation back then worthy of protection from invaders or saboteurs. Just like Bridges, powerstations etc.

I seem to remember somone on these boards was busy recording these old pillboxes. Maybe it was in the History and Heritage section?

Knarr

There's no mention of RTE facilities as of 2008 -

Defence Forces ATCP Operations Conducted in 2008
Type of ATCP Operations

Number of Operations

[FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman][FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman]

Cash in Transit (CIT) Escorts [/FONT][/FONT]

[FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman][FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman]

2,210 [/FONT][/FONT]

[FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman][FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman]

Prisoner Escorts [/FONT][/FONT]

[FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman][FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman]

118 [/FONT][/FONT]

[FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman][FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman]

Explosive Ordnance Disposal (EOD) call-outs [/FONT][/FONT]

[FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman][FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman]

180 [/FONT][/FONT]

[FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman][FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman]

Explosive Escorts [/FONT][/FONT]

[FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman][FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman]

18 [/FONT][/FONT]

[FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman][FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman]

Air Missions in support of ATCP (GASU) [/FONT][/FONT]

[FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman][FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman]

2,185 [/FONT][/FONT]

[FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman][FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman]

Public Building security[/FONT][/FONT][FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman][FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman]2[/FONT][/FONT]

[FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman][FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman]

366 [/FONT][/FONT]

[FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman][FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman]

Public Building patrols[/FONT][/FONT][FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman][FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman]3 [/FONT][/FONT]

[FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman][FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman]

732 [/FONT][/FONT]

[FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman][FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman]

Central Bank security guard [/FONT][/FONT]

[FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman][FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman]

366 [/FONT][/FONT]

[FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman][FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman]

Central Bank Patrols[/FONT][/FONT][FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman][FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman]4[/FONT][/FONT]

[FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman][FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman]

732 [/FONT][/FONT]

[FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman][FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman]

Portlaoise Prison security duties [/FONT][/FONT]

[FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman][FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman]

366 [/FONT][/FONT]

[FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman][FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman]

Explosive production security guard [/FONT][/FONT]

[FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman][FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman]

366 [/FONT][/FONT]

[FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman][FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman]

Shannon Airport security duties [/FONT][/FONT]

[FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman][FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman]

113 [/FONT][/FONT]

[FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman][FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman]

Shannon Airport patrols[/FONT][/FONT][FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman][FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman]5 [/FONT][/FONT]

[FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman][FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman]

22 [/FONT][/FONT]

[FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman][FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman]

Power Installations[/FONT][/FONT][FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman][FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman]6 [/FONT][/FONT]

[FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman][FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman]

366 [/FONT][/FONT]

[FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman][FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman]

Fuel Storage Facilities [/FONT][/FONT]

[FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman][FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman]

7 [/FONT][/FONT]

[FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman][FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman]

NS Salmon Patrols [/FONT][/FONT]

[FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman][FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman]

5 [/FONT][/FONT]

[FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman][FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman]

NS Guard Ship Duties [/FONT][/FONT]

[FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman][FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman]

1 [/FONT][/FONT]

[FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman][FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman]

NS involvement in JTF Ops [/FONT][/FONT][FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman][FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman]7 [/FONT][/FONT]

[FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman][FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman]

5 [/FONT][/FONT]

[FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman][FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman]

NS Support of Garda Water Unit [/FONT][/FONT]

[FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman][FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman]

1 [/FONT][/FONT]

[FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman][FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman]

NS ATCP Dive Operations [/FONT][/FONT]

[FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman][FONT=Times New Roman,Times New Roman]

13 [/FONT][/FONT]

Total

8,172

2 Government Buildings, Dublin.

3 Patrols to DFHQ (Colaiste Chaoimhin & Parkgate) conducted by Eastern Brigade Stand-To.

4 Patrol to Central Bank carried out by Eastern Brigade Stand-To.

5 Conducted from Sarsfield Barracks, Limerick.

6 Guard on ESB installation in Ballyshannon.

7 Operation Patrols conducted under the direction of The Ad Hoc Committee for Drugs Law Enforcement as established by the Criminal Justice Act 1996, Section 8.



http://www.defence.ie/WebSite.nsf/72804bb4760386f380256c610055a16b/9ff1390417799a2a802575e00037264f/$FILE/Defence%20Annual%20Output%20Statement%202009.pdf

BuckJamesRogers

My girlfriend lives just up the road from the factory and her dad works there so ive seen the lorries go up and down quite a few times but ive never seen them be escorted there by army wagons. there is an army guard at the factory though and i have seen the IIE trucks at Rockhill when it was being closed down, transport of stores i'm assuming. So they do have some connection with the DF. The DF guard the factory for obvious reasons. it really is a huge factory

Delancey

In the earlier phase of the 'Troubles' the main explosive used by the I.R.A. was commercial Gelignite that was made guess where...... the Enfield factory !
I saw a progarmme where a contributor ( cant recall if he was I.R.A. or security forces ) said that without that factory the I.R.A. would have been very limited in their bombings.......it seems that huge amounts of stuff were stolen/smuggled out of the place.

lignum

Thers less escorts now as they mostly sell liquid explosive which is mixed onsite at the quarrys and does not require an escort. Also the old celtic tiger is dead so less building and therefore less quarrying.