A new and much more dangerous (potentially deadly) means of stealing money from ATMs is occurring. Although most of this is happening in South Africa, it has happened recently in the United States, also.
Monica Laganparsad of the Times is reporting:
ATM blasts in KwaZulu-Natal have dramatically increased in the past two months.According to the article, there have been 194 ATM bombings in South Africa this year. One man had his arms blown off, while trying to use an ATM!
During the first five months of this year seven ATM bombings were reported in the province, but in the past two months the figure has jumped to 14.
The organised crime unit of the province’s police claims to be hot on the heels of those behind the blasts.
I would like to have found out that ATM bombings were purely a South African phenomenon, but they are not. On July 2nd, Fox News reported a similar series of attempts in Kansas City, here.
Stealing, or attempting to break into ATMs is nothing new.
Fox News has another video, where a "Bobcat earth mover" was used to steal a ATM machine in Kansas, here.
Times (South Africa) story, here.
ATM machine after being bombed courtesy of Pat Hawks at Flickr
2 comments:
I across the street when the bomb on this ATM went off.
At first I thought it was just some kids playing with firecrackers or something, but after seeing a few police cars come and go, decided I needed to investigate.
It's scary that stuff like this is coming to the United States.
Pat - I really appreciate your perspective. I'm surprised this only made the local news.
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