IF Guy Fawkes had succeeded with his gunpowder plot he would have devastated much of London as well as blowing the palace of Westminster sky-high.
Experts at the University of Wales in Aberystwyth have worked out for the first time the true extent of the damage Guy Fawkes would have caused if his daring deed had not been foiled on November 5, 1605.
Physicists from the university's Centre for Explosion Studies found that the amount of gunpowder Guy Fawkes packed into the cellar beneath the corridors of power would have been enough not only to destroy Westminster Hall and the Abbey but to cause substantial structural damage to many other buildings.
Using explosion physics the team deduced that streets up to one-third of a mile from the centre of the palace of Westminster would have suffered severe structural damage and windows would have shattered within a radius of two-thirds of a mile from the centre of the blast.
Dr Geraint Thomas, head of the Centre for Explosion Studies, who led the research, said that the 2,500kg of gunpowder Guy Fawkes was found with, would be equivalent to the same amount of TNT today.
