Imagine you’re a mechanic, and a regular old BMW rolls in one morning. The owner reports it won’t start. As you poke around, you find some bizarre wires underneath. You have an odd premonition as you begin to trace them. Sure enough, they lead you to three sticks of dynamite tucked beneath the vehicle.

No, this isn’t a fictitious scene from the latest blockbuster mob movie. This is an actual experience reported by a BMW mechanic who lives in Honolulu.

James Wilson said the car was a late model sedan. After he and his co-workers pushed it into the shop, they were in for a surprise.

After the mechanics called the police, the bomb squad took over their building and evacuated everyone nearby. According to Reader’s Digest, the FBI eventually impounded the car as evidence. And James? Once the adrenaline finally subsided he had the story to top all shop stories.

This device was likely intended to assassinate whoever started the vehicle next. To that purpose, someone had probably tried to wire the bomb’s detonator to the vehicle’s starter circuit. The goal would have been to activate the detonator with the surge of electricity released when the driver turned the key.

Did the owner of this BMW get incredibly lucky when their car failed to start? Possibly. But considering it was a newish car, there might have been something else at play.

I would wager the bomb-maker messed up, completely deactivating the starting circuit instead of just wiring the detonator into it. This was why the BMW’s driver found their car “broken” and called Wilson’s shop. Their “broken” car saved their life: if it had started they might not have survived the day.