Washington Post, 6 May 2010: The man suspected in last Saturday’s attempted bombing of Times Square drove in the heart of Manhattan one day earlier and left a getaway car near his target, U.S. officials said Thursday. . . Shahzad dropped off a getaway car last Friday in New York, a government official said, but a day later, he locked the keys to it, and to his Connecticut apartment, in an SUV that he drove into Times Square. That forced Shahzad to take the train back to his Bridgeport, Conn., apartment. The Associated Press first reported about the second car.

Officials have said the gray 1993 Nissan Pathfinder, left abandoned in Times Square and loaded with firecrackers, gasoline and propane, could have created a huge fireball and killed nearby tourists and Broadway theatergoers if it had gone off successfully. Kevin Barry, a retired member of the New York Police Department’s bomb squad, told the Associated Press that the design of the bomb — which included an improvised fireworks-and-powder detonator — showed Shahzad had sufficient training to understand the basics of rigging an explosive device. But the bomb also included fertilizer that was incapable of exploding.

The alleged plot “was at least the fourth major terrorist incident on U.S. soil in the last eight months,” Boehner said — referring to the failed plot to attack New York’s subways, the Fort Hood shootings and the failed Christmas Day bombing attempt of a jet over Detroit. . . .