WASHINGTON -- Officials said Thursday the foiled terror plot in Britain involved liquids that alone are harmless and hard to detect, but combined can be explosive when paired with a detonator and could trigger catastrophic consequences.

According to authorities, hand lotions, hair gels and contact lens solution cases all provide ways to hide liquid explosives. They also said that the materials are favored by terrorists because alone they are common and benign.

"With a very small amount of liquid, you get a big bang for your buck," said terrorism and security expert Michael Greenberger.

Chemicals such as nitroglycerin and acetone peroxide are not easily detectible by themselves, officials said, but they are extremely volatile and could be mixed into a bomb aboard a plane, particularly in the aircraft's lavatory.

"It's not difficult, at all. It's an easy thing to do. It's not something that requires great sophistication," said Greenberger. "What they were concerned about (is) that somehow the liquid explosives would be put into some device that can be triggered by something a simple as a key fob we use to open our car doors."

The Montgomery Country Fire and Rescue bomb squad has trained with the Department of Homeland Security and the FBI in dealing with liquid explosives.

Experts said only a small amount of liquid chemicals would be required to allow someone to obtain them from a chemical supplier without setting off alarm bells.

"We don't, from an operational security standpoint, want to go into too much detail on that, but unfortunately, it's available to obtain these recipes for that. They are very common industrial and commercial processed chemicals," said Chief Mike Love of the bomb squad.

Officials said that there were a number of reports that the planes used in the terror plot would have been detonated over the Atlantic, preventing pilots from landing.

"They clearly were looking for something that would really bring shock and awe, if you will, to the United States and to Britain. And having 10 airplanes explode simultaneously in midair would have accomplished that objective," said Greenberger.

Officials said explosives used in Downing Pan Am Flight 103 weighed only a couple of pounds.