Shankill Road bombing

Shankill Road bombing
Part of the Troubles
Aftermath of the bombing
Location	271 Shankill Road, Belfast, Northern Ireland
Coordinates	54°36′14″N 5°57′07″W / 54.604°N 5.952°W / 54.604; -5.952
Date	23 October 1993 13:00 (GMT)
Target	UDA leadership
Attack type	Time bomb
Deaths	10 (including bomber)
Injured	57
Perpetrator	Provisional IRA Belfast Brigade
No. of participants	2

The Shankill Road bombing was carried out by the Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA) on 23 October 1993 and is one of the most well-known incidents of the Troubles in Northern Ireland. The IRA aimed to assassinate the leadership of the loyalist Ulster Defence Association (UDA), supposedly attending a meeting above Frizzell's fish shop on the Shankill Road, Belfast.^[1][2] Two IRA members disguised as deliverymen entered the shop carrying a bomb, which detonated prematurely. Ten people were killed: one of the IRA bombers, a UDA member and eight Protestant civilians, two of whom were children.^[3][4] More than fifty people were wounded. The targeted office was empty at the time of the bombing, but the IRA had allegedly realised that the tightly packed area below would inevitably cause "collateral damage" of civilian casualties and continued regardless. However, the IRA have denied this saying that they intended to evacuate the civilians before the explosion.^[5][6] It is alleged, and unearthed MI5 documents appear to prove, that British intelligence failed to act on a tip off about the bombing.^[7]

The loyalist Shankill Road had been the location of other bomb and gun attacks, including the Balmoral Furniture Company bombing in 1971 and the Mountainview Tavern attack and Bayardo Bar attack both in 1975, but the 1993 bombing had the most casualties. It resulted in a wave of revenge attacks by loyalists, who killed 14 civilians in the week that followed, almost all of them Catholics. The deadliest attack was the Greysteel massacre.