Deal barracks bombing

The Deal barracks bombing was an attack by the Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA) on the Royal Marine Depot, Deal, England. It took place at 8:22 am on 22 September 1989, when the IRA exploded a time bomb at the Royal Marines School of Music building. The building collapsed, killing 11 marines from the Royal Marines Band Service and wounding another 21.

The Royal Marines School of Music is a professional training centre for musicians of the Royal Marines Band Service, the musical arm of the Royal Navy. Originally created at Portsmouth in 1930, it moved to Deal in 1950 and in 1989 was still there as part of the Royal Marine Depot, Deal. Throughout the 1980s, the IRA had been waging a paramilitary campaign against targets in Britain and Northern Ireland with the stated aim of achieving the separation of Northern Ireland from the rest of the United Kingdom. These operations had included an attempt to kill the British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher in 1984 and a similar attack on a military band in London in 1982.

At 8:22am on 22 September 1989, a 15 lb (6.8 kg) time bomb detonated in the recreational centre changing room at the Royal Marines School of Music. The blast destroyed the recreational centre, levelled the three-story accommodation building next to it and caused extensive damage to the rest of the base and nearby civilian homes. The blast was heard several kilometres away, shaking windows in the centre of Deal, and created a large pall of smoke over the town. Most of the personnel who used the building as a barracks had already risen and were practising marching on the parade ground when the blast occurred. These marines witnessed the buildings collapse, and many of the teenaged personnel were in a state of shock for days afterwards.

Some marines had remained behind in the building, and thus received the full force of the explosion. Many were trapped in the rubble for hours and military heavy lifting equipment was needed to clear much of it. Kent Ambulance Service voluntarily agreed to end its industrial strike action to aid those wounded by the blast. Ten marines died at the scene with most trapped in the collapsed building, although one body was later found on the roof of a nearby house. Another 21 were seriously injured and received treatment at hospitals in Dover, Deal and Canterbury. One of these men, 21-year-old Christopher Nolan, died of his wounds on 18 October 1989. Three of those killed were buried nearby at the Hamilton Road Cemetery, Deal.