Police blow up (most likely empty) Japanese grenades

[Papa Nambu]

http://www.daytondailynews.com/news/...an-esta/nMyy8/

The grenades were probably empty and the bomb squad just wanted to justify their existence (plus they love to blow stuff up). This is why it's a good idea to put a nail or marble or something inside your empty ordnance to rattle around and let even the dumbest sheeple know it's empty.

[Nick Komiya]

Clever idea!

[muddinman04]

That is definitely a "why didn't I think of that" idea! It is a shame that those had to be destroyed. They were most likely empty.

That same happened less than a mile away here in Newark, OH about 4 months ago. Turns out this grenade was live though!

[blinky]

The logic then from the police would probably be "well, they used to pack nails and ball bearings in grenades to act as schrapnel".....
When cops want to blow something up, they'll blow something up.

[rajko84]

They already took the story down. Anybody has pictures?

[juoneen]

I recall a case of japanese grenades being found at the glendale(AZ) swap meet , some years ago. They were the kind that had a bamboo wedge that was placed in the top then hit and thrown. All were live , and a few sold before the cops came (5.00 each)and took the wooden case away when i was walking up. Lots of stick grenades also were buried by some collectors and vets , and of course will be unstable by now. Always buy stuff like this with caution, and through much study before messing with ANY grenades to be sure they are not going to make you one of the last ww2 casualtys. (especially watch out for practice rifles made by the japanese with cast iron receivers.) if you chamber a round of smokeless ww2 ammo, you can really blow those up easily, and so before messing with stuff like that ask advice of the more experienced who make it their business to know what you have is safe or not.

[Papa Nambu]

They already took the story down. Anybody has pictures?

Still works for me, but here's another (shorter) article about the same story http://www.cantonrep.com/newsnow/x13...ng-estate-sale

[rajko84]

Still works for me, but here's another (shorter) article about the same story http://www.cantonrep.com/newsnow/x13...ng-estate-sale

Thank you

[busterz111]

Why most liekely empty? There are hundreds of these pieces that are live in vet hands,i know a guy who had 6 us grenades he duffle bagged home and they were found mid 90's after he passed.

[Papa Nambu]

Because I will make the claim that most Japanese grenades in the US today are not live. Unlike a US grenade, they were fairly easy to inert. The whole top unscrews. The only reason someone would bring back a live Japanese grenade is because they wanted live grenades (in which case they would have been better off bring home some US grenades that work better), most GIs just wanted a souvenirs.

I'm not saying it's impossible they were live, my point is that police bomb squads LOVE to blow stuff up (one does not get such a job without wanting to blow things up), and they will make absolutely no effort to check if an old grenade or shell is inert, regardless of any historical value, they will always opt to stick some C4 on it and blow it up. So if you collect such things, you should take precautions to let people know they are harmless.