Bloody Friday (1972) Totally Explained

Everything about Bloody Friday 1972 totally explained

Bloody Friday is the name given to the bombings by the Provisional Irish Republican Army's (IRA) Belfast Brigade in and around Belfast, Northern Ireland on July 21, 1972, which killed nine people including two soldiers, and injured 130 civilians.
The bombings were part of a concerted bombing campaign carried out by the IRA against economic, military and political targets in Northern Ireland. The group carried out a total of 1,300 bombings in 1972. Following the failure of secret talks in London between the British government and the IRA in 1972, Gerry Adams allegedly played a central role in planning the Bloody Friday bomb blitz.

Overview

A total of 22 bombs were planted and, in the resulting explosions, nine people were killed and a further 130 civilians injured. Along with some accurate warnings which were given by the IRA, two more hoax warnings were called in, which impeded the evacuation of the area. As a result, the Royal Ulster Constabulary and British Army only effectively cleared a relatively small number of areas before the bombs went off. In addition, because of the large number of bombs in the confined area of Belfast city centre, people evacuated from the site of one bomb were accidentally moved into the vicinity of other bombs.
Thirty years after the killings the IRA issued a statement of apology.

Sequence of events - 21 July 1972

The accounts of the events that appeared in the first editions of local and national newspapers were, naturally enough, somewhat confused about the details of the events of the day. The timetable compiled by CAIN below is approximate and given in BST/IST (GMT+1). The details are based on a number of secondary reports and accounts.
479 people died in the Troubles in 1972, more than in any other year of the conflict. Ten days after the bombings the British Army launched Operation Motorman, to retake IRA controlled republican areas in Belfast and Derry. There were several revenge attacks by loyalists. Bloody Friday itself was seen by some as a reprisal attack for Bloody Sunday in Derry six months earlier.

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