Federal authorities believe Shamsud-Din Jabbar, who killed 14 people in an ISIS-inspired vehicular attack in New Orleans, used a common explosive compound in two homemade bombs that did not detonate, ATF Special Agent in Charge Joshua Jackson said Sunday.
On Friday, two senior law enforcement officials briefed on the matter told NBC News that preliminary field tests indicated that Jabbar used a very rare explosive compound. The compound, called R-Salt, has never been used in a U.S. or European terrorist attack or incident.
Jackson said the FBI is going to conduct additional tests of the explosive compound found in New Orleans. He said officials believe that additional tests at an FBI lab will show that the explosive compound found in New Orleans is, in fact, pure RDX. R-Salt is similar in makeup and texture to RDX.
Neither of the homemade devices exploded and it remains unclear whether the failure was due to a malfunction, lack of activation or another issue. Jabbar planned to use a transmitter to detonate the two bombs, which were placed in coolers, authorities have said.
The carnage unfolded when Jabbar, 42, drove onto a sidewalk with a pickup truck, bypassing a police vehicle that had been parked to block cars from pedestrians celebrating on the crowded street.
Police killed Jabbar, a Texas-born U.S. citizen and an Army veteran, moments after the attack.
Jabbar had also set fire to a short-term rental house on Mandeville Street in New Orleans, where bomb-making materials were found, Friday’s joint statement added, “in his effort to destroy it and other evidence of his crime.”
The New Orleans Fire Department responded to the fire at around 5:18 a.m., after Jabbar had carried out the attack on Bourbon Street, but the fire had “extinguished itself” before spreading to other rooms, allowing for the “recovery of evidence, including pre-cursors for bomb making material and a privately made device suspected of being a silencer for a rifle,” the statement said.
The agencies said in the statement that it was determined that Jabbar was the only person who could have set the fire.
The FBI has stated that the investigation remains ongoing and it has not changed its posture that Jabbar acted alone.
A mourning period for the victims of the attack will begin Monday, when President Joe Biden and first lady Jill Biden will travel to New Orleans.
Clarification: This story has been updated to clarify the nature of the explosives after officials updated their assessment.
