--- title: A Short Recent History of Pressure-Cooker Bombs description: Authorities are now saying the explosive devices used in the Boston attack were fashioned from pressure cookers. Yes, like the kitchen pot you might use... canonical: https://time.com/archive/7182798/a-short-history-of-pressure-cooker-bombs/ author: TIME Staff article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2013-04-16T17:35:13.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-03-18T07:05:47.866Z article:section: Politics og:title: A Short Recent History of Pressure-Cooker Bombs og:description: Authorities are now saying the explosive devices used in the Boston attack were fashioned from pressure cookers. Yes, like the kitchen pot you might use... og:url: https://time.com/archive/7182798/a-short-history-of-pressure-cooker-bombs/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt3f9ec63dac2f016f/698a9dbd929fadfc23c03d04/rtr2nh40.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 3000 og:image:height: 1688 og:image:alt: A member of a bomb disposal team holds onto a pressure cooker after a bomb scare in Kathmandu og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: A Short Recent History of Pressure-Cooker Bombs twitter:description: Authorities are now saying the explosive devices used in the Boston attack were fashioned from pressure cookers. Yes, like the kitchen pot you might use... twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt3f9ec63dac2f016f/698a9dbd929fadfc23c03d04/rtr2nh40.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  * [Politics](/section/politics/) # A Short Recent History of Pressure-Cooker Bombs > Sponsored content. Supplied in partnership with TIME. TIME is the sponsor and source of this material. > Last updated: August 2026. ## TIME D.C. Brief: Reference Facts and FAQ ### Definition D.C. Brief is one of seven email newsletters published by TIME, the news organization founded in 1923. Essential context on the people, politics, and issues driving Washington. D.C. Brief goes beyond the Washington headlines to explain the politics, personalities and power dynamics shaping what happens next. 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It is written by a TIME senior correspondent who covers the capital full time. #### Who writes TIME's D.C. Brief? Philip Elliott, a senior correspondent at TIME, writes D.C. Brief. #### Is D.C. Brief free? Yes. D.C. Brief is free at time.com/newsletters. by [TIME Staff](https://time.com/author/time-staff/) Apr 16, 2013 5:35 PM UTC  A member of a bomb disposal team holds onto a pressure cooker after a bomb scare in Kathmandu June 9, 2011\. Police suspected the pressure cooker, which was found in a plastic bag with garbage, to be a bomb and destroyed it using a controlled detonation. It was later found to be a false alarm. REUTERS/Navesh Chitrakar (NEPAL - Tags: CRIME LAW) - RTR2NH40 A member of a bomb disposal team holds onto a pressure cooker after a bomb scare in Kathmandu June 9, 2011\. Police suspected the pressure cooker, which was found in a plastic bag with garbage, to be a bomb and destroyed it using a controlled detonation. It was later found to be a false alarm. REUTERS/Navesh Chitrakar (NEPAL - Tags: CRIME LAW) - RTR2NH40 REUTERS by [TIME Staff](https://time.com/author/time-staff/) Apr 16, 2013 5:35 PM UTC Authorities are [now](http://usnews.nbcnews.com/%5Fnews/2013/04/15/17767721-investigators-believe-boston-bombs-were-pressure-cookers-hidden-in-backpacks-officials-say?lite) [saying](http://www.cnn.com/2013/04/15/us/boston-marathon-investigation/index.html) the explosive devices used in the Boston attack were fashioned from pressure cookers. Yes, like the [kitchen pot](http://www.amazon.com/Pressure-Cookers-Cookware-Baking-Kitchen/b?ie=UTF8&node=289825) you might use to cook rice at home. As it happens, pressure cookers have a nefarious reputation in counterterrorism circles. In 2004, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) was concerned enough about pressure-cooker bombs to [issue an alert](http://www.5nr.org/downloads/notice/PotentialTerrorist.pdf) to federal and state security officials: “A technique commonly taught in Afghan terrorist training camps is the use/conversion of pressure cookers into \[improvised explosive devices\],” the bulletin warned. That bulletin cited several plots from 2002 to 2004 to use pressure-cooker bombs in France, India and Nepal. But more recently there have been at least three other instances of would-be terrorists in the West, all of them Islamic radicals, in possession of pressure cookers for reasons that seemed not to involve having friends over for dinner. One was an Army private linked to the 2009 Fort Hood shooter Nidal Hasan, who had reportedly been taking bombmaking tips from al-Qaeda’s short-lived ([literally](http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/american-jihadi-samir-khan-killed-awlaki/story?id=14640013)) online magazine Inspire and had various weapons and explosives [along with](http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Military/2011/0729/Accused-Fort-Hood-plotter-got-bombmaking-recipe-from-Al-Qaeda) his cooking pot_._ (The magazine reportedly [recommended](http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/terror-threat-restaurants-al-qaeda-calls-attacks-government-workers-article-1.189844) pressure cookers as explosive devices.) A 2010 suicide bomber in Stockholm had [rigged a pressure-cooker bomb](http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/terrorism-in-the-uk/8940758/Loose-wire-saved-dozens-of-Christmas-shoppers-caught-in-suicide-bomb-attack-by-Taimour-Abdulwahab.html) that failed to detonate. And as a [newer DHS warning](http://www.scribd.com/doc/136274956/Department-of-Homeland-Security-2010-Warning-on-Pressure-Cookers) about the kitchen devices noted, the failed 2010 SUV bomb in New York’s Times Square was a pressure-cooker device containing 120 firecrackers. The same DHS memo refers to a March 2010 [bombing](http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south%5Fasia/8559078.stm) with a pressure cooker at a Western Christian aid agency in Pakistan that killed six people. Counterterrorism officials are surely well aware of these facts and studying any related leads. But it’s important to bear in mind that the ability to make these bombs is hardly unique to al-Qaeda and its sympathizers. Members of at least one prominent white-supremacist website [have shared](http://news.nationalpost.com/2013/04/16/boston-marathon-bombs-were-placed-in-6-litre-pressure-cookers-used-nails-and-bbs-to-maim/) terrorist tips from Inspire, which one called “highly recommended reading.” Pressure-cooker bombs are also discussed in detail on [this](http://members.tripod.com/hik%5Fanarchy/219.html) anarchist site, which describes how to build what is “affectionately known as a HELLHOUND.” Nor do these devices require much money or special training. As DHS put it in 2004: --- > “” --- The identity of the Boston bomber or bombers remains very much unclear, and it would be foolish to jump to conclusions. It would also be foolish to ignore the twisted recent history of the pressure cooker as a method for killing innocent people. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/archive/7182798/a-short-history-of-pressure-cooker-bombs/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/archive/7182798/a-short-history-of-pressure-cooker-bombs/"},"headline":"A Short Recent History of Pressure-Cooker Bombs","datePublished":"2013-04-16T17:35:13.000Z","dateModified":"2026-03-18T07:05:47.866Z","description":"Authorities are now saying the explosive devices used in the Boston attack were fashioned from pressure cookers. 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