the morning of march 6, 1970, while finishing up preparations to bomb the non-commissioned officers dance at fort dix, robbins and two other new york collective members, diana oughton and ted gold, blew themselves up in the explosion of a new york city townhouse. (gold was not in the basement at the time; he had just returned from the strand bookstore). the explosion originated from the basement floor of the townhouse at 18 west 11th, in which robbins and oughton had been working. other members deduced that robbins' inexperience in the art of bomb making led him to mistakenly cross wires and set off a premature detonation. the remains of the bodies found in the basement were almost unidentifiable; the police were able to identify the remains of diana oughton by a fragment of her thumb. ted gold's body was found outside, crushed under the townhouse's framework. it was only with the issuance of the first official weather underground organization (wuo) communiqué, weeks after the explosion, that terry robbins was identified as the last victim.