KARACHI, June 18: The state of the blown-up bodies in Friday’s car bombing near the US Consulate was similar to that of the victims of the powerful Bohri Bazaar explosion in 1987.

“In fact, after the Bohri Bazaar blast which claimed around 200 lives, the US Consulate blast was the second most-powerful blast in the city in terms of the high intensity of explosives used,” said a senior forensic expert of the Sindh Medical College (SMC), Prof Ghulam Ali Memon.

Forensic experts from both Dow Medical College and the SMC have reached a consensus in their opinion that the explosive device used in the US Consulate blast weighed more than 10kgs.

The experts were of the view that there is a strong possibility that a thorough search would yield human body parts and splinters from the rooftops of buildings situated in a radius of at least 1km from the site of the blast.

Experts said that the total disintegration of the Toyota Corolla car and considerable destruction of the Suzuki Hi-roof, which was ascertained to be passing next to the Corolla, tantamounts to the high intensity of the explosive used in the bombing.

Sources said that the Corolla was blown up to such an extent that the engine and chassis number of the ill-fated car could not be collected from the spot by investigators.

The particulars of the car were retrieved from the record present at the Excise Department by the police, subsequently.

Referring to the stark differences between the May 8 explosion on Club Road and the US Consulate blast, forensic experts said that the bodies of the eleven Frenchmen were relatively intact and had not been ripped apart by the force of the explosion.

They said that splinters of the vehicles and other particles were found in abundance on the dead bodies.

Whereas, in the US Consulate blast, doctors said that many organs were ripped apart by the impact of the blast.

In the afternoon of June 14, body parts collected from the Frere Garden were sent to the Civil Hospital in plastic bags.

The in charge of the Civil Hospital’s medicolegal section said that initially they were told that the body parts belonged to six different men.

It was only after examination that they ascertained the remains to belong to four women.

The remains were identified by their relatives through personal belongings such as rings, etc.

Similarly, their ages were ascertained by the examination of their feet, Dr Hafiz Athar said.

He said that there were no traces of splinters or glass, but only leaves which were present in abundance.

The four women were identified as Farkhunda Jabeen, aged 38, Nida Nazeer, aged 20, Nazish Karim, aged 19 and Rehana Parveen, aged 32.

The hospital sources said that they did not find any identifiable traces of explosives on the remains.

Police presumed the presence of a fifth woman in the Corolla, after they found a lady’s purse near the site of the incident.

The victim was identified by her son after an NIC was recovered from the purse, raising the number of deaths in the blast to 12, including six women, police said.

The police are still searching for her remains among the wreckage, sources said.

A senior forensic expert of the JPMC, Dr Ghulam Ali Memon, said: “We lack training as well as skill in identifying the pieces of splinters from the traces of the explosive material found on the victims’ remains.”

Referring to the high death toll in the May 8 blast as compared to June 14, experts said that it was due to the fact that the full impact of the May 8 blast was taken by the ill-fated bus carrying the eleven French technicians in a compact space.

Only two bodies were mutilated, one of the suspected suicide bombers’ and the other of a Frenchman sitting in the bus close to the point of impact, experts said.