Boston bombs similar to explosive devices used against our troops in Afghanistan and Iraq

The New York Times is reporting that

the explosives used to kill three people and injure 176 at the Boston Marathon on Monday were likely some kind of “pressure-cooker” devices that sent sharp bits of shrapnel flying into victims in the vicinity of the blast, several law enforcement officials said Tuesday.

Representative Michael McCaul, a Texas Republican who heads the House Homeland Security Committee, said the authorities believe that the explosives were similar to improvised explosive devices that have been used against American troops in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Rudimentary explosive devices made from pressure cookers have been widely used in attacks in Afghanistan, India, Nepal and Pakistan, all countries where the cooking device is common, according to a Department of Homeland Security warning notice issued in 2010. But they have occasionally turned up in attacks in the United States as well: Faisal Shahzad, an American citizen who tried a car-bomb attack on Times Square in 2010, included a pressure cooker loaded with 120 firecrackers in the collection of jury-rigged explosives in his vehicle.

Read more here: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/17/us/officials-investigate-boston-explosions.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0