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Published On: Fri, Apr 13th, 2018

Patio Construction in North Myrtle Beach Leads discovery of Civil War Ordnance

North Myrtle Beach officials asked residents to stay inside of their homes in Waterway Landing after a suspicious item was found. The North Myrtle Beach Department of Public Safety also requested that residents stay inside.

The scare came during a patio design gone wrong. Workers were constructing a patio for a resident when they came across an “unexploded piece of ordnance.” The description is lacking, but workers assume that the “piece of ordnance” is a mortar shell that didn’t explode.

The construction scene quickly turned into a fiasco for the owner as the Horry County bomb squad descended on the scene. The bomb squad’s task is to determine if the ordnance was still live and posed a risk to residents on Waterway Drive.

photo/ screenshot of video covering Civil War shell in North Myrtle Beach, SC.

“ALERT FOR WATERWAY DRIVE AREA: While constructing a patio behind a home on Waterway Drive in North Myrtle Beach, workers unearthed an unexploded piece of ordinance, possibly a mortar shell. NMB Public Safety has secured the scene and Horry County bomb squad on site,” tweeted the city of North Myrtle Beach.

The owner of the property claims that the construction crew was clearing space for a flower bed at the time. Workers had to remove a tree and found the potential mortar shell underneath the tree roots. The owner claims that the workers didn’t have to dig deep to find the shell, which dates back to the Civil War era.

Shaw Air Force Base’s ordnance team also came out to the home to properly remove the device. Officials verify that the device was from the Civil War and was a 3″ Parrot round. Following the removal of the device, the team took the ordnance west of the Intercostal Waterway and destroyed the ordnance.

Battalion Chief Overholser got the honors of detonating the round from a safe distance using remote detonation. North Myrtle Beach Fire and Rescue posted a video of the explosion on Twitter and other social media sites.

Traffic on the street was closed for nearly four hours before officials deemed the road safe to travel. Neighbors in the community hope that this is the only ordnance that will be found in the quaint neighborhood.

Carolina Forest also found several ordnances a little over a week ago. The former Myrtle Air Station was being rezoned as construction crews came across numerous ordnance items. Officials from Shaw were called to the area and had to later detonate two large ordnance.

Residents reported the loud explosions to officials, with residents claiming that the explosions were strong enough to shake their homes.

Teams that descended on the scene claim that they must first identify the ordnance and inspect the item to verify that the ordnance is safe for transport. The item, if deemed safe, is then transported to a safe location that allows officials to detonate the ordnance.

All items are considered potentially hazardous. Older items, like those from the Civil War era, are volatile thanks to the unstable explosive fillers inside of the ordnances. Shaw’s EOD team claim a total of 12 ordnance were found during the rezoning, with only four of them containing explosives.

Author: Jacob Maslow

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