Grazing Cattle Foil Massive Bomb Attack in Ulster

BELFAST, Northern Ireland — Grazing cattle apparently foiled a massive bomb attack by the Irish Republican Army, police said Friday.

Police said they received a tip that a bomb had been planted near a road in County Tyrone, apparently ready for use against an army or police patrol. Officers found an estimated 500 pounds of explosives packed into three metal garbage cans at a hut, near a sewage pump station.

The outlawed IRA, fighting to end British rule in Northern Ireland, later admitted they had tried twice to detonate the bomb but it would not explode.

IRA members told local news media that grazing cattle had chewed through the detonating cord, a police spokesman said.

Once police located the cache they evacuated eight homes and a gasoline station. Traffic was diverted away from the area as army experts defused the bomb.