This involved some 1 million pounds of
ammonal explosive and killed around 10,000 German troops instantly.
A charge of 60,000 lbs (26.8 tons) of
ammonal explosive was blown, resulting in a crater 98 feet deep and 300 feet across.
Far better to visit Messines, south of Ypres, where in June, 1917 Allied troops heralded their initial attack on Passchendaele by detonating the biggest mine of the war, 91,000lbs of
ammonal nitrate.
If the mine used a water-soluble explosive such as
ammonal, it would be rendered inert within a short time.
In addition, three patrols included parties - an NCO and four ORs - detailed to carry
ammonal tubes and insure that lanes were blown through the German wire for withdrawal purposes.
'Some German
ammonal bombs have yet to explode,' I am told uponmy return to Ypres.
When zero came my anxiety was that some of the mines had been sitting in extremely wet ground for nearly a year, and the explosive was
ammonal which doesn't go off when its wet; it was in soldered waterproof tins --but we wondered how they'd fared.
This high vantage point was practically leveled by the tunnellers in 19 sequential explosions of over a million pounds of
Ammonal, the newest high-explosive.
A series of chambers would be dug to hold the explosive charges of, usually,
ammonal. The explosive chambers would be tamped; that is, the ends of the gallery would be blocked with sandbags, interspersed with spaces.