FBI defuses bomb theory

Even before the first wreckage was recovered from the Atlantic, people were proclaiming that it was probably a bomb that destroyed TWA 800.

"This was a bomb on board, without a doubt," terrorism expert Larry Johnson said at the time. "You do not get these kinds of catastrophic mid-air explosions in airliners without an explosive on board."

James Kallstrom, assistant director of the FBI's New York office, told reporters it looked "pretty darn conclusive" that either a bomb or a missile caused the explosion. Months later, he would conclude that there was no evidence to support such theories.

Two early leads seemed to support the bomb theory: the discovery of trace amounts of explosive residue on some of the recovered aircraft parts and the seeming similarity between the crash of Flight 800 and that of a Colombian airliner in 1989.

Investigators found small amounts of explosive residue on some pieces of wreckage. However, they also soon learned that the explosive residues were most likely contamination from a security training exercise conducted a month before. [Full text of NTSB report on explosive residue, 2/18/97]

However, despite the theories and thousands of hours painstaking police work, the FBI has concluded that there is no evidence the plane was brought down by a bomb. Accordingly , it suspended its investigation into the crash.

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