Army investigating ordnance found in driveway material

Tue Feb 15, 7:47 PM ET

By Steve Goldstein, Knight Ridder Newspapers

WASHINGTON - Prepare to be shell-shocked: Ordnance experts are scrambling to defuse driveways that have the potential to explode.
The U.S. Army is investigating incidents of unexploded World War I-era munitions showing up in clamshells used as paving material for driveways and parking areas in Delaware, Maryland and Virginia.
The ordnance was dredged up over the past 18 months from the ocean floor during mechanical clam harvesting operations off the New Jersey coast, in the vicinity of Atlantic City, according to Robert Williams of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, which is conducting the probe.
More than 300 munitions - mostly British and French-made hand grenades but at least one 75 mm projectile containing a chemical agent - have been recovered from 18 driveways and a Delaware clam-processing plant, Williams said.
Some grenades were actually found inside the clams.
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"We're worried about kids playing kick the ball in the driveway," he said.
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Locating exactly where in the ocean the questionable quahogs were dredged has proven difficult.