LAKEPORT, Calif. – An old military explosive that a community member brought to the Lakeport Police Department on Monday morning caused a temporary closure of police headquarters but later in the day was safely detonated at another location, the city's police chief said.
The item's disposal on Monday afternoon allowed the police department to once again reopen to the public after a closure of several hours, according to Lakeport Police Chief Brad Rasmussen.
Just after 9 a.m. Monday, a local woman arrived at the Lakeport Police Department on 916 N. Forbes St. with an old piece of military ordnance, Rasmussen said.
Rasmussen said the woman was hoping police would be able to get rid of the item. “It was something that had been in her family for quite some time,” said Rasmussen.
While the woman wasn't aware that it was dangerous, she no longer wanted it in her house, he said.
The item, which Rasmussen said was smaller than a travel coffee mug, was thought by the woman to be some kind of big bullet.
“We recognized right away that it was a very old military ordnance,” said Rasmussen.
The shell didn't have any marks on it, leading officers to determine that it was a live, unfired round and not a type of replica. He said they subsequently evacuated the police department and parking lot, keeping the ordnance in a secure area of the building.
Police would later follow up with the family that had the ordnance to get more information about it, Rasmussen said.
Based on that additional information and research police did during the day, Rasmussen said they concluded that the item was possibly a century-old French-made 37 millimeter shell that came from World War I.
With an item that old, Rasmussen said the concern is that it is potentially unstable, and could explode if it's handled too roughly or dropped.
“That's why we got concerned,” said Rasmussen.
Initially, Rasmussen said the Lakeport Police Department contacted the Napa County Sheriff's Office bomb squad, which often responds to issues in Lake County regarding possible explosive devices.
“We wanted to get it rendered safe and destroyed,” Rasmussen explained.
However, after the item was described to the Napa County officials, they urged Lakeport Police to instead contact a military explosives unit, according to Rasmussen.
Ultimately, the 9th Civil Engineering Squadron from Beale Air Force Base responded, Rasmussen said.
The 400-plus member squadron's Web page lists explosive ordnance disposal and emergency management among its specialties.
After a team from the squadron was cleared to respond, it arrived at about 2:30 p.m. Monday, Rasmussen said.
Rasmussen said a safety briefing was held that included the squadron, Lakeport Police, Lakeport Fire, Lakeport Public Works and Lake County Office of Emergency Services Manager Marisa Chilafoe.
At that point they determined the best location to detonate the object was at the city's sewer treatment ponds, which are located on the outskirts of the city, Rasmussen said.
“We found a safe spot over there,” Rasmussen said, adding they made sure the detonation wouldn't create a fire hazard.
Rasmussen said officers gave the team a police escort out to the site, where the squadron got down to the business of detonating the item. That included placing a very long fuse on the ordnance so team members could safely get away before the explosion.
“They did a phenomenal job on exploding it,” said Rasmussen, noting that the team completely disintegrated the shell, and the entire operation was very smooth.
Rasmussen was not on scene for the detonation, but he said his officers described it has having a big boom, with a strong concussion.
Residents in some areas nearby reported hearing the boom when the ordnance was detonated.
Rasmussen said the Beale squadron members told police that the item was an anti-aircraft round.
During World War I, aircraft were becoming an important new tool in warfare. While petite by modern standards, the shell still likely would have felled the kinds of smaller planes – primarily made of canvas over wood frames – commonly flown at that time by the war's famed pilots like Manfred von Richthofen, known as the “Red Baron.”
The 9th Civil Engineering Squadron members told police and that they recently had dealt with an almost identical piece of ordnance, which had been found at a residence in another part of California, Rasmussen said.
Cases of old military ordnance being found in homes or brought to police stations, Rasmussen noted, are not uncommon.
He pointed to the discovery last week of World War II-era grenades and mortars in a Palo Alto home that caused some evacuations of homes while the Santa Clara County bomb squad responded to detonate the items.
In February 2013, the Lakeport Police Department also dealt with an inert mortar found in a package at the UPS customer service center on Craig Avenue, which the Napa County bomb squad handled, as Lake County News has reported.
Email Elizabeth Larson at
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