I'm now actually rather curious about the range safety stuff for the SRBs - one of the dangers of an SRB is that there's basically no way to shut it down, and indeed they kept going for some time after Challenger blew up
What I've heard (no research) is that thrust termination for a solid rocket works by charges opening the top end, so that the exhaust exits from both ends and the thrust mostly cancels itself out, or perhaps by splitting along the length of the side (destroying all integrity). In any case, the fuel still burns, but you can stop it from accelerating further.
Hm. A solid rocket burns from one end, opening up the nose will do nothing to the thrust. Splitting a side, I would guess, will lead to uncontrolled acceleration with chaotic flight path, but not zero acceleration.
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