The challenges of moving took an unexpected turn for Mat Reichardt and his family when he found something unusual beside their new home: a grenade. He was very diligent about leaving me instructions all over the house,” Reichardt, from Portland, Oregon, told Newsweek. First, he never told me where the shut-off valve for the outdoor spigots is.
Second, he left a grenade on the side of the house.” Reichardt was searching for the spigot shut-off valve when he made the explosive discovery. It was a canister, not a pipe. I took the lid off and recognized the pin and fuse.” It had been 20 years since Reichardt had last played a video game, but he immediately recognized what was in his hands, having seen something similar while playing Battlefield on his old Xbox many moons ago.
Robert Burrell is a senior research fellow at the University of South Florida Global and National Security Institute. He is also a retired U.S. Marine with combat experience and an expert in military science.
When presented with photographs of the discovery that Reichardt shared with Newsweek, Burrell identified the grenade as most likely a U.S. military grenade equipped with an M201A1 fuze. He said the fuze pictured is used for ignition in both the M18 colored-smoke grenade and the AN-M14 thermite incendiary grenade, and that the design dates back to at least the 1950s. But that doesn't make the device inert.” Burrell said anyone who finds a munition of this kind should consider it “potentially live and extremely dangerous.” “Stop handling or moving it immediately, keep others away, and contact the local police department to request an Explosive Ordnance Disposal (EOD) assessment,” he said.
Reichardt initially called the police department's non-emergency line after finding the grenade. The two officers who subsequently arrived decided to call in a bomb squad. Since it was military-issued, they said that, per protocol, they had to send it to a nearby military base for proper disposal.” Reichardt is at a loss to explain how or why the smoke grenade ended up beside the house.
Now it's something he can look back on and laugh about. Contact Newsweek editors on this story: Marc Vargas and Emma Lee-Sang
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