First female bomb squad member reveals how she stopped Mother of Satan bombing style in Australia
Bomb expert Jodie Pearson was sitting at her desk when one of the most volatile explosives on the planet arrived. She helped prevent a deadly explosion.
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A childhood obsession with Dick Smith electronics helped prevent a Mother of Satan London bombing style detonation in Australia, this nation’s first and most experienced female bomb disposal expert has revealed for the first time
Police Inspector Jodie Pearson was sitting at her desk in the police bomb squad room when in 2013 a bag was found in an estuary 150km south of Perth with 3kgs of white crystalline powder that resembled methamphetamine or sugar.
It was taken back to a police headquarters in Perth for storage and later routine drug analysis when officers made the horrifying discovery it wasn’t drugs but TATP – triacetone triperoxide also known as Mother of Satan and one of the most volatile explosives on the planet.
It was TATP that has been used in Europe for terror attacks notably the 7/7 bombings in London in 2005 which killed 56 people and more recently by ISIS in the November 2015 Paris attacks, 2016 Brussels attacks, 2017 Manchester Arena bombing and various bombings across Iraq and Syria.
“We got the confirmation it was TATP, (the explosive used in the London bombings) so that changed everything,” she said. “…We evacuated everybody from the entire building. We evacuated everybody from the neighbouring building.
“In the London bombings, a policeman stood on some granules on the ground and it exploded under his foot. So when you’ve got three kilos, we were thinking, oh, my goodness, it was pretty much unheard of, it was the largest amount in the southern hemisphere ... So this was really something significant,” said Inspector Pearson.
Now in a new podcast series of Police Tape, Insp Pearson speaks at length for the first time about the day she donned her bomb suit as several blocks of the city were evacuated and what was going through her mind as she walked away from the command post staring straight out through her small face window screen in the heavy suit with only the sound of her own breathing.
It was never going to be this way but she recalled it all started with a childhood love of electronics.
Download and listen to Deborah Wallace on Episode One:
Download and listen to Jodie Pearson on Episode Two:
Pearson was a police tactical analyst, helping plan for tactical police raids and bomb squad assignments when she offered a job cleaning the bomb squad shed, doing audits of kit and charging equipment.
“I thought oh well that’s a start … but I had a secret weapon,” she said.
“One part of the selection process was showing your competency in electronics and my dad was an electronics technician in the navy and so were my two brothers. So on the weekends when we were growing up, my dad’s idea of fun if it was a rainy day was to do all the Dick Smith’s electronic things. So I thought, “Oh my God, I’ve got this in the bag.
“So, my aptitude testing was quite good and so they put me through the (bomb technician) selection process. And in the end, they kind of thought, “Well, we’re probably going to have to give her a go because she’s been successful.
“So, it wasn’t until I actually completed the training that during the graduation speech, he said, “Oh, she’s the first female bomb technician in Australia.” And I thought, “Oh, okay. That’s pretty exciting.” But to me, it was just a kind of sort of a job that I wanted to do. And I thought, “Well, I’m going to kind of do it by any means.”
Australia has 64,000 police officers and more than a quarter of them are women.
Hosted by crime reporter Natalie O’Brien, the five part Police Tape Blue Sirens series hears from five top policewomen from around the country detailing their careers including countering bombings, battling gangs and how they cope dealing with the aftermath of violence, deaths and murders.
CATCH UP ON SERIES POLICE TAPE: SERIES ONE
CLICK HERE: Detectives lift lid on nation’s most gripping cases in Police Tape podcast
Originally published as First female bomb squad member reveals how she stopped Mother of Satan bombing style in Australia