VANCOUVER, May 12, 2004
The Canadian Press

The blast which downed Air India flight 182 originated in a baggage area containing bags loaded in Toronto, a defence aircraft explosion expert suggested Wednesday at the trial of the two accused bombers.

The evidence is key to Ajaib Singh Bagri's defence theory.

Prosecution witness Prof. Christopher Peel has testified the blast came from baggage container 52 in the right aft cargo area. Bags in that area were loaded in Vancouver.

But defence witness Dr. Edward Trimble told the court Wednesday all the evidence points to container 51, which contained bags loaded in Toronto.

The two containers were separated by less than a metre, but if Judge Ian Josephson finds the bomb was in 51, the connection between Bagri and the bomb vanishes.

``All of the evidence I've observed in the reconstruction (of the plane wreckage) is consistent with a source in this area,'' Trimble said marking 51 on a diagram of the cargo area.

Radiating from his pinpoint, Trimble drew arrows indicating blast directions.

While he spoke of several areas of damage, he said there was ``ample evidence'' of a ``heavy pulse'' to baggage container 44.

Trimble said traces of a metal found in damage to the recovered container 44 could have come from luggage.

And, he added, damage to container 44 was consistent with a blast exploding from nearby about a metre above the cargo bay floor.

``(It's) well within the vertical height of the 100 bags that were stacked within baggage area 51,'' he said. ``There was a veritable wall of bags within baggage area 51.''

The plane exploded off the coast of Ireland June 23, 1985 killing all 329 aboard.

Much of the wreckage is still at the bottom of the ocean. Pieces were recovered and have been studied to try to determine what happened on board.

Josephson called the difference in Peel's and Trimble's positions ``startling'' and asked for the experts to critique each others' conclusions.

Josephson has heard evidence that Bagri wanted to borrow a car to take some bags to Vancouver International Airport just before the bombing. He told a female friend, whose name remains protected by court order, only the bags would be leaving.

Testimony from experts continues on Thursday at a secret warehouse in the Vancouver area containing the reconstructed wreckage of the Boeing jet.

Bagri and Ripudaman Singh Malik are being tried on charges of conspiracy and murder in connection with the explosion that downed Flight 182.

Malik and Bagri also face charges connected to an explosion at Tokyo's Narita airport the same day.

A total of 331 people died in the two attacks.

The Crown alleges the pair were part of a group of B.C.-based Sikh separatists known as the Babbar Khalsa who targeted the national airline of India to retaliate for the Indian Army's attack a year earlier on the Golden Temple, Sikhism's holiest shrine.