I’m not usually one to get excited about this sort of stuff, but living as I do at pretty-much the epicentre of the coming Olympics in Vancouver 2010 issues of security, terrorism, and other such hysteria have got my spider-senses tingling.  I’m fairly convinced that, given Canada’s very active participation in NATO’s Afghan adventure and numerous related transgressions, there will be some sort of attempt at terrorist action during the Games.

I’m doubly convinced that while the VANOC Gestapo is concerning itself on the front lawn with ebbing peaceful protests, sweeping our homelessness and drug problems under the rug, and thwarting any attempt by commercial enterprises to steal some Olympic mojo; they’ve left the back door open for morons who might claim some affiliation to the non-existent Al Qaeda to blow up a rented cube truck filled with god-knows-what in my neighbourhood.

Reinforcing my fear of their ineptitude, today it is revealed that Kinder Morgan, the company that has brought local residents a string of oil spills over the past few years, have .. um .. misplaced at least two tonnes of ammonium nitrate which was in a truck en route from Alberta to North Vancouver sometime over the December holidays.  Kinder Morgan is attempting to play this off as a “clerical error” however we’ve heard that from them before, as oil gushed into Burrard Inlet and drowned an entire Burnaby neighbourhood in a thick black film.

They lost two tonnes of ammonium nitrate.  In Vancouver.  You can’t be serious.

As Global Security reports, ammonium nitrate is used to make about 95% of the bombs in Afghanistan, and was also the medium of choice for the foiled efforts of the Toronto 18, who had themselves obtained 3 tonnes of ammonium nitrate.  The reason for this bomb-making method’s popularity is that the recipe for making such a device using ammonium nitrate is so simple an idiot could do it.

In 1995 Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols (two complete idiots if I’ve ever seen one) used a 600-pound ammonium nitrate bomb, mixed with a fuel oil called nitromethane, to attack and destroy the federal building in Oklahoma City.  The attack killed 168 people.  McVeigh and Nichols had purchased exactly two tonnes of ammonium nitrate prior to constructing their bomb, which they assembled in the back of a cube truck.

Ask yourself this: do you trust with your safety the very same public officials who will allow a couple of tonnes of high-explosives to disappear while simultaneously announcing that you are no longer able to take books on airplanes?

UPDATE: Bob Mackin points out that Kinder Morgan’s North Vancouver dock will also host a cruise ship providing visitor accomodations during the Olympics.  Good luck with that!