Workers at a Massachusetts shellfish plant were processing a load of clams when they made a potentially explosive discovery, 126 hand grenades, officials said.
It's not unusual for grenades and other munitions to turn up in traps along the East Coast, but 126 is a relatively large number for one catch, WCVB-TV, Boston, reported.
Workers at the Fair Tide Shellfish plant in New Bedford found the grenades in late April – some of them with pins still attached – in a catch of clams that had been dredged off Long Island.
"Come to find out, based on what the Navy said, they were live. They were loaded for bear so to speak," Fair Tide Shellfish Finance Executive Tom Slaughter said.
The grenades were in wooden crates covered with dark muck, he said.
"When one broke open, we found all the grenades inside," Slaughter said.
The plant was evacuated and the Massachusetts State Police Bomb Squad, along with the US Navy Explosive Ordnance Disposal team, placed the grenades in a dump truck filled with sand and transported them to a jetty, where they were detonated.
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