NEW ALLIED EXPLOSIVE - The Courier-Mail (Brisbane, Qld. : 1933 - 1954) - 27 Sep 1943 (original) (raw)

'RDX' stands for Research

Department, Formula X. It is

not new. but difficulty was ex-

perienced in making it on a use-

ful scale. The War Office Re-

search Department achieved this

just before the outbreak of war.

It was used for the first time

In April, 1941, when a Welling

ton bomber dropped a 40001b.

block-buster on Emden. The re-

sults confirmed the most opti-

The colour and smell of RDX

suggests a sweet more than an

explosive. Actually it looks like

When the first process of fill-

ing a shell with the explosive

at Woolwich Arsenal was going

forward, something went wrong.

A group of men watching the

process through mirrors from

behind a blast wall saw what

was happening and ran into the

They were too late, and there

was a tremendous explosion. A

roll-call had to be made for

identification of five victims.