Reading Police Station Evacuated After Woman Brings In Mortar Round
READING (CBS) – The Reading police station was evacuated late Thursday morning after a woman brought in a bag with a mortar round and live ammunition.
The state fire marshal's office said the woman found it cleaning out her late husband's things. He was a World War II veteran. Police said the device was a 60mm training round.
The bomb squad was called in, determined the device was inert and took it away for disposal.
Police and fire closed Union and Middle streets and the Harnden Street parking lot behind Walgreens.
Reading Police said in a tweet that it "had the potential to explode and cause injury" but the fire marshal's office said the device "contained no explosives."
No one was hurt. 911 calls were answered by surrounding towns during the evacuation. The police station reopened about noon.
"Thankfully this device was determined to be inert and no one was injured," Deputy Chief David Clark said. "We train for incidents of this nature, and I want to commend officers, the fire department and state police for their quick and efficient response today. Public safety dispatchers did a fantastic job quickly evacuating the station and setting up operations at Town Hall so that the community would not experience any disruption to services. As a reminder, residents should never bring devices like these to the police department. Instead, please call us directly and we will respond to you."
