Car bomb explodes outside Belfast police station, PSNI links attack to New IRA tactics seen in Lurgan case, delivery driver forced to transport device as residents evacuated

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Homes were evacuated after an explosion outside Dunmurry police station bbc.com

The explosion happened in Dunmurry late on Saturday bbc.com

An investigator at the scene of the explosion in Dunmurry. Photograph: Niall Carson/PA theguardian.com

A car bomb exploded outside Dunmurry police station on the outskirts of Belfast late on Saturday after a delivery driver was hijacked and forced to bring the vehicle to the station, police said. The Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) is treating the incident as attempted murder and says it believes dissident republicans from the New IRA were involved. No one was killed or injured, despite the blast occurring in a residential area as officers were evacuating nearby homes.

According to the BBC, the driver’s car was taken in Twinbrook in west Belfast shortly before 11pm, fitted with a device involving a gas cylinder, and driven under coercion to the station. PSNI deputy chief constable Bobby Singleton said officers moved residents—including two babies—away from the immediate area moments before the device detonated, calling the absence of casualties “nothing short of miraculous”. The Guardian reports Singleton argued the device’s “reckless unpredictability” mattered as much as its technical sophistication, with debris thrown in multiple directions.

The incident also underlines how quickly Northern Ireland’s security environment can be pulled back toward the tactics of the Troubles: coercing civilians to deliver explosives, exploiting the predictability of police infrastructure, and choosing locations where collateral harm is almost guaranteed. Singleton said investigators see “very many similarities” with an incident last month at Lurgan police station, where a delivery driver was forced at gunpoint to transport a device that failed to explode; the New IRA later claimed responsibility for that attempt. The repetition suggests a method being refined—testing devices, procedures, and police response times—while shifting risk onto civilians who are least able to refuse.

Political leaders across the spectrum condemned the attack. UK prime minister Keir Starmer urged anyone with information to come forward, while Northern Ireland’s first minister Michelle O’Neill said those behind the bombing “speak for absolutely no one”, the BBC reported. The Guardian quotes policing board chair Brendan Mullan describing the device as “sent to kill officers and cause maximum harm” in the middle of a residential area.

The charred remains of the vehicle were removed from outside Dunmurry station on Sunday as detectives continued forensic work at the scene. Police said the delivery driver had been subjected to a “traumatic experience” and appealed for witnesses and information about the hijacking and the vehicle’s movements that night.