Aborted Robbery Attempts
The Metropolitan Police were able to identify the possible days that the raid could take place and communicated this information to De Beers and the dome management. Two of the days that the police had identified resulted in aborted attempts. The first aborted attempt occurred in early October and was called off due to the malfunctioning of the speedboat which was to be used for the getaway. The second aborted attempt occurred one day before the date of the actual raid but was called off as the gang discovered the tide was too low to ensure a safe getaway. After the second aborted attempt the police suspected the raid was imminent and were convinced the raid would take place the following day. As a result of this the police replaced all dome staff with armed undercover officers. On a number of days in October, the gang under surveillance looked as if they were about to commence with the raid. Some members of the gang were spotted towing a speedboat to Greenwich and then placing the boat in the river opposite the Dome. This activity indicated to the flying squad that the robbery was close; however this was not the case. As a result of this the flying squad investigated the reason behind the delay. The detectives analysed the times and days of the aborted attempts and found that they had something in common - the tide. On closer investigation the detectives found that on each of the days when the robbery was aborted the tide was at its highest possible level. The police began to investigate the patterns of the tide and were able to predict the possible times that the raid was to take place. One of the predicted days happened to be the date of the actual raid.
Read more about this topic: Millennium Dome Raid
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