re: #206 Shiplord Kirel

I had my own experience with a relative’s weapons cache while I was living in California back in the 80s. I dropped by my parents’ house to see how my dad was doing on his project to restore a ‘41 Chevy pickup (now mine, btw). My stepmother’s mother had died a few weeks earlier and the stepmother had been cleaning out her mom’s house. I was sitting at the kitchen table with my dad when the stepmother emerged from the garage with a small but seemingly heavy cardboard box in hand. It was very old and dusty. She said she had found it in her mother’s garage and thought I might be able to identify the contents. I could, for she opened the box and casually lifted out a LIVE 75mm ARTILLERY SHELL, fuse and all, from World War 2. I got her to hand it to me, very, very carefully, then asked her to put a fluffy towel in the bottom of the box. She did so and I gently placed the shell back in the box. We then left the house, in some haste. We called the sheriff, who called the CHP, who called in the Air Force EOD team from a nearby base. The AF bomb squad removed the shell and put it in an armored box on the back of a truck. It was destroyed on the AF weapons range. The ATF took statements from everyone and decided that the stepmother’s father was probably responsible. Since he had been dead for 10 years, there were no charges.

A few years back, one of my parents’ neighbors passed away. Korean war vet. When the family was going through his garage, they found a half dozen live grenades tucked away under a work bench.