NJ Train Explosive: Man Carrying Homemade Fireworks Faces Charges

A NJ man was charged with having an explosive on a train just days before the bombing at the Boston Marathon, but the case appears to be more a case of ignorance than terrorism.

Police charged a Jersey City man, 27-year-old Mykyta Panasenko, with having the explosives at his home and on a train. Police said he had two improvised explosive devices made with a cylinder container filled with the propellant powder Pyrodex.

Panasenko was also charged with recklessly creating widespread risk of injury or damage to a building for having the explosive on the NJ train. He took the explosive material on April 7 onto a NJ Transit Train heading from Hoboken to Suffern, New York, police said

The story hits the news as tensions are high in the wake of the Boston bombing, which killed three people and left more than 180 injured. Law enforcement officials are still on high alert, especially in the Northeast, though authorities said the NJ train explosive case doesn’t appear to be a terrorist threat.

“Police recovered components of an explosive device at his home, not a completed device,” a police statement said, according to the Jersey Journal. “However, the investigation revealed that he did transport completed devices from his home at some point.”

In fact, as the news began to spread on the internet in recent days, Panasenko said it made him frightened to be associated with the words “terrorist” and “bombs.”

“I’m not feeling well,” he said. “After all the stuff I just read about myself online, I almost passed out.”

Police said it didn’t appear the NJ man planned to detonate the explosive on the train.

“There is no indication at this point of the investigation that he intended to detonate a device in his building or on the transit system,” Jersey City cops said in a press release.

After appearing in court on Wednesday, the man accused of carrying the explosive on the NJ train was released on his own recognizance.