Two powerful SAS rifles and 500 bullets have gone missing in the past year
Two powerful SAS rifles and 500 bullets have gone missing in the past year
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Two Special Forces rifles, 500 bullets and hundreds of laptops, computers and USBs went missing from the Ministry of Defence last year, Metro can reveal. The powerful C8 Rifles, believed to be used by the Special Air Service (SAS) and Special Boat Service (SBS) in close combat, were lost between January and December 2024, according to new data.
![[Firearms and weaponry consultant David Dyson wearing a lab coat]](https://metro.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/David-Dyson-88c4-e1737988821256.jpg?quality=90&strip=all&w=297)
The weapons are believed to have been used by the Royal Military Police in close protection work and the special forces in room clearing operations in Afghanistan and Iraq. More than 560 ‘explosive munitions’, including nearly 100 bullets used by the rifles, were also classed as ‘lost or stolen’ between January and December 2024.
![[British L1A1 Self-Loading Rifle]](https://metro.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/SEI_237543526-cf21-e1737981077200.jpg?quality=90&strip=all&w=646)
Six deactivated rifles worth thousands of pounds were also stolen from the Ministry of Defence (MOD) last year, according to data obtained through a Freedom of Information request. These included a mid-20th century Self-Loading Rifle, currently on sale for as much as £1,900, and a Lee-Enfield Rifle, first produced in 1892 and used by the British Army in both World War I and II, which goes for as much as £1,600.
![[Long, brown deactivated Lee-Enfield Rifle]](https://metro.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/Lee-Enfield-2-9ca9-e1737981618854.png?w=349)
‘It goes without saying that these are military carbines and could create havoc in the wrong hands,’ David Dyson, a firearms and weaponry consultant, told Metro. ‘Although I don’t have any confirmable information on where they were used, I think you can assume that they could have been used wherever the SAS were deployed.
