page_title: Coagh ambush
section_title: The ambush
hierarchical_section_title: Coagh ambush / The ambush
caption_attribution_description: English: Vauxhall Cavalier MK3 1.6 GL
context_page_description: The Coagh ambush was a military confrontation that took place took place in County Tyrone, Northern Ireland, on 3 June 1991, during The Troubles, when a Provisional Irish Republican Army active service unit from its East Tyrone Brigade was ambushed by the British Army's Special Air Service at the village of Coagh, in County Tyrone, whilst on its way to kill a part-time member of the Ulster Defence Regiment. The ambush resulted in the deaths of all three IRA men involved.
context_section_description: At 7.30 am on 3 June 1991, three Tyrone IRA paramilitaries – Tony Doris (21 years old), Michael "Pete" Ryan (37) (on the run at the time from the Royal Ulster Constabulary since 1981 after escaping from imprisonment in Belfast for terrorist related offences) and Lawrence McNally (39) – drove a stolen Vauxhall Cavalier from Moneymore, County Londonderry to the village of Coagh, crossing the border of counties Londonderry and Tyrone, to kill a part-time Ulster Defence Regiment soldier, who was in his civilian life a contractor that worked with the security forces. Their intent, however, was known to the British security forces, having been revealed by either a Crown agent within the IRA itself, or from covert technical surveillance. In consequence a detachment from the British Army's Special Air Service was lying in wait for Doris, Ryan and McNally on both sides of Coagh's main street, and also in a red Bedford lorry at the scene.
  The stolen car was driven by Doris towards the centre of the village, its journey from Moneymore being tracked on the ground and in the air. At the scene of the ambush the British Army had set up a "decoy" target for the IRA to go for in the form of an SAS trooper who was pretending to be their intended victim, sitting in his car at a regular spot while waiting to pick up a friend on their way to work, which IRA intelligence had established the behavioral pattern of. When the stolen car carrying the IRA men approached the scene the Special Air Service detachment opened sustained automatic fire upon it from close range. Doris was immediately hit, and the out-of-control car crashed into two nearby parked cars. The shooting continued until the car exploded in flames and set one of the parked vehicles it had crashed into alight. According to an eyewitness, one of the IRA men in the car returned fire from within the vehicle after the crash. Some reports claim at least two of the IRA men attempted to exit the crashed car  and were subsequently found lying half out of its doors by the later police investigation of the scene. Relatives of the IRA men subsequently stated that they had received information from the scene that two of the IRA attackers had fled on foot from the car after the crash, but had been pursued after and shot down by the British Army in the vicinity, with their bodies being taken back to the car, which was subsequently reported to be riddled with over 200 bullet holes. A Royal Ulster Constabulary crime-scene report stated that a balaclava belonging to one of the IRA men was found some distance away from the vehicle.
  The bodies of Doris, Ryan and McNally were badly burnt by the car fire, and had to be identified by police using their dental records. Two rifles were recovered from within the burnt-out stolen car, subsequent police forensic examination of them revealing that they had both been used in the multiple murders at Leslie Dallas's garage (see above) in March 1989.
caption: A red Vauxhall Cavalier like that driven by the IRA men at the time of the ambush
exif: {"Image Make": "FUJIFILM", "Image Model": "A850", "Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image XResolution": "72", "Image YResolution": "72", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image Software": "Digital Camera FUJIFILM A850 Ver1.01", "Image DateTime": "2009:04:13 13:02:05", "Image YCbCrPositioning": "Co-sited", "Image Copyright": "", "Image ExifOffset": "300", "Image PrintIM": "[80, 114, 105, 110, 116, 73, 77, 0, 48, 50, 53, 48, 0, 0, 2, 0, 2, 0, 1, 0, 0, 0, 1, 1, 0, 0, 0, 0]", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "72", "Thumbnail YResolution": "72", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "1880", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "5157", "Thumbnail YCbCrPositioning": "Co-sited", "EXIF ExposureTime": "1/850", "EXIF FNumber": "14/5", "EXIF ExposureProgram": "Program Normal", "EXIF ISOSpeedRatings": "100", "EXIF ExifVersion": "0220", "EXIF DateTimeOriginal": "2009:04:13 13:02:05", "EXIF DateTimeDigitized": "2009:04:13 13:02:05", "EXIF ComponentsConfiguration": "YCbCr", "EXIF CompressedBitsPerPixel": "2", "EXIF ShutterSpeedValue": "97/10", "EXIF ApertureValue": "307/100", "EXIF BrightnessValue": "5", "EXIF ExposureBiasValue": "0", "EXIF MaxApertureValue": "3", "EXIF MeteringMode": "Pattern", "EXIF LightSource": "Unknown", "EXIF Flash": "Flash did not fire, auto mode", "EXIF FocalLength": "61/10", "EXIF FlashPixVersion": "0100", "EXIF ColorSpace": "sRGB", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "3264", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "2448", "Interoperability InteroperabilityIndex": "R98", "Interoperability InteroperabilityVersion": "[48, 49, 48, 48]", "EXIF InteroperabilityOffset": "1732", "EXIF FocalPlaneXResolution": "6129", "EXIF FocalPlaneYResolution": "6129", "EXIF FocalPlaneResolutionUnit": "3", "EXIF SensingMethod": "One-chip color area", "EXIF FileSource": "Digital Camera", "EXIF SceneType": "Directly Photographed", "EXIF CustomRendered": "Normal", "EXIF ExposureMode": "Auto Exposure", "EXIF WhiteBalance": "Auto", "EXIF SceneCaptureType": "Standard", "EXIF Sharpness": "Normal", "EXIF SubjectDistanceRange": "0"}