Bomb scare after man pulls pin on antique grenade
A street was evacuated by a bomb squad after a man pulled the pin on an antique hand grenade.
Army personnel sealed off Bixton Close in Northwick, Worcestershire, after the resident caused panic on Sunday evening.
He had bought the RG-42 from an antiques market in Malvern more than a year ago for £30 and did not think it was a live device until he pulled the pin and it 'started making noises'.
The man, who did not want to be named, said he had been showing the item to a few friends when he pulled the pin and realised something was wrong.
He said: 'It started making noises. I noticed something was wrong as soon as I released the safety pin and the spoon sprung off it immediately.
'It made some sort of reaction similar to when a firework fuse is ignited. It was a spilt second, I immediately threw this at the rear of the garden and evacuated the property and called the police.
'I was told to be a minimum 100m away and try to alert neighbours. Police arrived within several minutes.'
A bomb squad X-rayed the grenade to see if it was still active, the resident said.
He said one member of the team was 'sure it was decommissioned but not certain, so he put it inside what looked to be a heavy-duty explosives box and told me he is going to dispose of it back at base'.
'A few people were worried in the street. The area was locked for about three to four hours,' he added.
West Mercia Police, alongside an Explosive Ordnance Disposal Unit, attended the scene at about 7pm.
A police spokesman said: 'The EOD team X-rayed the grenade and found it was empty, so there was no need for a controlled explosion.'
The resident said he 'never intended to cause harm or distress' to anyone and had been led to believe the item was deactivated when he purchased it.
The Russian grenade is a collectable for Second World War enthusiasts and is distinguishable by its cylindrical design.
Broaden your horizons with award-winning British journalism. Try The Telegraph free for 1 month with unlimited access to our award-winning website, exclusive app, money-saving offers and more.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
CNBC
2 hours ago
- CNBC
Ukraine drones attack on Moscow forces airport closure, Russia says
A Ukrainian drone attack targeting Moscow forced the closure of two of the key airports serving the capital, Russian authorities said early on Sunday. Russia air defence units destroyed nine Ukrainian drones heading towards Moscow by 0400 GMT, Mayor Sergei Sobyanin said on the Telegram messaging app. Emergency services were dispatched to the sites where drone debris fell in the overnight attack, Sobyanin said. He did not report any immediate damage. A Ukrainian drone attack also sparked a short-lived fire at the Azot chemical plant in the Tula region, injuring two people, and seven drones were destroyed over the Kaluga region, regional governors said. Both regions border the Moscow region to the south of the capital. Reuters could not independently verify the reports. There was no immediate comment from Ukraine. Russia's civil aviation authority Rosaviatsia said on Telegram that to ensure air safety it was halting flights at the Vnukovo and Domodedovo airports. Russia and Ukraine have increased their attacks in recent weeks while also returning to peace talks for the first time since the early days of the war that Russia launched against Ukraine in February 2022.
Boston Globe
11 hours ago
- Boston Globe
Russia pummels Kharkiv with drones and bombs, Ukraine says
On Saturday afternoon, Russia dropped two more glide bombs on the city, killing at least one more resident and injuring at least 16 others, Terekhov said. Advertisement Photographs released by Ukraine's emergency services showed the upper floors of a residential block ablaze after the overnight strike, with white smoke pouring into the early morning sky. In other images, rescuers sifted through the charred wreckage of a gutted apartment. Parts of the photos were blurred, likely to hide the remains of two people killed in that strike, according to the rescuers. A third person died elsewhere in Kharkiv, and about 20 others were injured in the assault. Advertisement The local prosecutor's office said Saturday afternoon that six people were most likely still trapped under the rubble of an industrial facility in Kharkiv that was struck during the overnight attack. The attacks Saturday came as Russian forces about 100 miles north of Kharkiv pushed deeper into Ukraine's northeastern Sumy region, seizing two more villages and advancing their effort to carve out a buffer zone along the Russia-Ukraine border. Even in Kharkiv, a city of 1.3 million that over the years has learned to live with near-daily Russian bombardments, Saturday's attacks were a clear sign of Russia's strategy to intensify air assaults in a bid to overwhelm and break through Ukraine's air defenses. They came just a day after Russia launched one of its biggest air assaults of the war across Ukraine, involving more than 400 drones and more than 40 missiles, in what Russia described as retaliation for Ukraine's audacious attacks on its strategic bomber bases last weekend. President Donald Trump this past week compared the dual air assaults between Russia and Ukraine to 'two young children fighting like crazy.' 'They hate each other, and they're fighting in a park, and you try and pull them apart,' Trump said Thursday in an Oval Office news conference. 'They don't want to be pulled. Sometimes you're better off letting them fight for a while and then pulling them apart.' In an interview with ABC News released Friday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy responded to the comment. 'We are not kids with Putin at the playground in the park,' he said, referring to Russian President Vladimir Putin. 'He is a murderer who came to this park to kill the kids.' In April, a Russian missile struck a playground in Zelenskyy's hometown, Kryvyi Rih, killing 19 civilians, including nine children. It was the deadliest strike against children since the beginning of the war, according to the United Nations. Advertisement Russia's intensified attacks have come alongside a new offensive in the east and in the northeastern Sumy region. The push into Sumy follows Russian forces driving Ukrainian troops back from parts of Russia's Kursk region, just across the border from Sumy. To prevent future incursions into Kursk, Putin announced last month that Russian forces would launch an offensive in Sumy to create a buffer zone along the border. In the past three weeks, Russian troops have seized about 10 villages in the area, gaining control of roughly 75 square miles of territory. 'It's clear this is already an offensive on Sumy region -- a full-scale offensive,' said Andrii, a 44-year-old company intelligence commander fighting there who declined to be identified with his full name for security reasons and due to military protocol. He said he saw the offensive not only as an effort to establish the buffer zone that Putin called for, but also as a strategy to pin down Ukrainian forces and prevent their redeployment to other front-line hot spots in the east. Andrii said Russian troops were currently pushing toward the village of Khotin, 6 miles from the border. If they seize it, he warned, the situation could turn critical. Khotin sits on high ground and lies less than 12 miles from the city of Sumy, the regional administrative center, close enough for Russian forces to strike it with drones and artillery. Sumy is home to about 250,000 people. More than 200 villages and settlements have been evacuated from the Sumy region over the past year because of the fighting. Advertisement This article originally appeared in
Yahoo
12 hours ago
- Yahoo
Zelenskyy: Over 40 injured in Kharkiv, these are not "retaliatory" strikes
One woman was killed and more than 40 were injured in a Russian attack on Kharkiv with guided aerial bombs on Saturday 7 June. Source: Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Telegram and in the evening address Quote: "As of now, more than 40 people were reportedly injured and one killed in Kharkiv as a result of a Russian guided aerial bomb attack. Another brutal murder. Aerial bombs on civilians in the city – even near a children's railway. This makes no strategic sense. It is pure terrorism. And it has been going on for more than three years of full-scale war. This cannot be ignored. We cannot turn a blind eye to it. And this is not a game. Every day we lose our people only because Russia feels it has impunity. We need to force Russia to make peace." Updated: In his evening address, Zelenskyy said that "no matter what anyone says, these are not 'retaliatory' Russian strikes, but strikes aimed at destruction, the complete destruction of life." Zelenskyy stressed that no form of pressure on Russia should be weakened – neither the measures that have already been applied nor the methods of pressure that are being prepared. "We are working to increase Ukrainian air defence. We need positive signals from the US, specific signals on air defence. We are still waiting for a response to the offer to buy systems that can help," he said. Background: At around 17:35, Russia attacked the Shevchenkivskyi and Kyivskyi districts of Kharkiv with four guided aerial bombs. A 30-year-old employee of Ukrzaliznytsia (Ukrainian Railways) was killed and at least 18 other people were injured. Four of the victims are employees of Ukrzaliznytsia. The attack damaged two buildings of a children's railway and four railway carriages, as well as houses and an outbuilding. Support Ukrainska Pravda on Patreon!
