Construction workers digging near the frontage road known as Moanakai in Kapa‘a were surprised to find what law enforcement confirmed yesterday to be an undetonated land mine. A crew from Akahi Services Inc. found the device while doing trench work
Construction workers digging near the frontage road known as Moanakai in Kapa‘a were surprised to find what law enforcement confirmed yesterday to be an undetonated land mine.
A crew from Akahi Services Inc. found the device while doing trench work for the Kapa‘a to Anahola portion of the bike and pedestrian path.
Kaua‘i Police Department Lt. Kaleo Perez, district commander, said what construction crews unearthed was a round, disc-like object about 10 inches in diameter and about 1 inch thick.
“Construction workers were working the area doing ground work contracted by the county when they came upon the device, that was dug up about a foot beneath the surface,” Perez said.
Perez said the workers, who found the land mine Tuesday afternoon, immediately notified their supervisor, who in turn called police. The device was located at the north end of Moanakai Road on the mauka side of the street, he said.
When police arrived on-scene, Perez said, they found what appeared to be an “old, bomb, heavily-covered with soil.”
Police then called Schoffield Barracks and spoke with its Explosive Ordnance Disposal section officials.
“We then sent them digital photos but we still weren’t sure what it was, took digital photos and sent them via e-mail,” Perez said.
Mary Daubert, county spokeswoman, said photographs were also sent to the state Department of Health Hazard Evaluation and Emergency Office.
Saying the pictures appeared to show some form of land mine, three members of the 706 division of the U.S. Army arrived on-island yesterday morning. In the interim, Kaua‘i police guarded the mine with patrol officers.
“ The area was evacuated, and we put up barriers to prohibit entering into the area and guarded it overnight,” Perez said. “We couldn’t take the risk of anybody coming upon it and handling it in any way.”
When Army officials arrived yesterday, they identified the land mine as either an M6 or M12, only the latter of which is explosive.
Then Army officials carried the device in a metal container, with their hands, to the far end of the beach near the waterline, dug a hole in the sand and blew up the device using a remote control.
Perez said though it’s impossible to know exactly where the device came from, it was likely from the military exercises done in the past by U.S. soldiers.
• Amanda C. Gregg, assistant editor/staff writer, can be reached at 245-3681 (ext. 252) or agregg@kauaipubco.com.
