— from Sheriff Rob Nou —
Two Orcas Island men cleaning out a storage unit in the Rosario area on Tuesday came across grenades and a rocket propelled grenade and called sheriff’s deputies. Deputies secured the scene and called the Washington State Patrol Bomb Squad.
Bomb technicians arrived Wednesday morning. A search of the scene turned up additional explosives, incendiary materials, military ordinance and components. Most of the items found were from the World War II era. The WSP Bomb Squad called the military, and a US Navy Explosive Ordinance Disposal team responded from Whidbey Island.
Several items were “made safe” by the technicians. Other military hardware along with explosive and incendiary materials were removed by WSP and Navy EOD.
The contents of the storage unit belonged to a recently deceased Orcas Island man. It was being cleaned out upon request of his estate. No further investigation is planned.
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I appreciate all tht the Sheriffs Dept does, but…
It would have been nice if they could have handled the destruction of the devices with a little more thought to those of us who live near the Eastsound office. Either dentonation in a more remote location (rock quarries are good!) or some advance warning would have been nice. Coming home to freaked out and missing pets along with freaked out kids was no fun. Couple that with the fact that the phones were all down and people were really freaking out.
Glad the explosives are taken care of but wish a little more care had been taken to think about the safety of the neighborhood.
Our family was freaked out too. The house actually shook from the explosion. I assumed it was a transformer blowing up related to the power outage. So much for “safe and sane”