Baltic Exchange bomb

Baltic Exchange
Stained glass window from the old Baltic Exchange building (now in the National Maritime Museum)
General information
Type	Office
Location	St Mary Axe London, EC3
Coordinates	51°30′53″N 0°04′51″W / 51.5146°N 0.0807°W / 51.5146; -0.0807Coordinates: 51°30′53″N 0°04′51″W / 51.5146°N 0.0807°W / 51.5146; -0.0807
Completed	1903
Design and construction
Architect	Smith and Wimble
Main contractor	George Trollope & Sons

The Baltic Exchange was a building located at 24–28 St Mary Axe in London and occupied by Baltic Exchange Ltd, a provider of information on maritime transportation markets.

The historic building was designed by Smith and Wimble and completed by George Trollope & Sons in 1903: it was subsequently listed as a Grade II* listed building.

On 10 April 1992 at 9:20 pm, the façade of the Exchange's offices at 24–28 St Mary Axe was partially demolished, and the rest of the building was extensively damaged in a Provisional Irish Republican Army bomb attack. The one-ton bomb was contained in a large white truck and consisted of a fertilizer device wrapped with a detonation cord made from 45 kg of semtex. It killed three people: Paul Butt, 29, Baltic Exchange employee, Thomas Casey, 49, Baltic Exchange doorman, and 15-year-old Danielle Carter. Another 91 people were injured.

The bomb also caused damage to surrounding buildings, many of which were also badly damaged by the Bishopsgate bombing the following year. The bomb caused £800 million worth of damage, £200 million more than the total damage caused by the 10,000 explosions that had occurred during the Troubles in Northern Ireland up to that point.

Architectural conservationists wanted to reconstruct what remained from the bombing, as it was the last remaining exchange floor in the City of London. English Heritage, the government's statutory conservation adviser, and the City of London Corporation insisted that any redevelopment must restore the building's old façade onto St Mary Axe. Baltic Exchange, unable to afford such an expensive undertaking alone, sold the site to Trafalgar House in 1995. The remaining sculptures and masonry of the structurally unstable façade block on the site were photographed and dismantled before the sale; the interior of the Exchange Hall, which was regarded as stable, was initially sealed from the elements in the hope that it would be preserved in situ in any new development, but was subsequently dismantled and stored offsite in 1995–96.