SAN ANTONIO – The San Antonio Police Department’s Bomb Squad was called to a Southwest Side neighborhood Saturday after dozens of rounds of ammunition were found underneath a home.The ammunition was discovered on the 7900 block of Dempsey Drive, near Old Pearsall Road and Southwest Military Drive, around 2:45 p.m. Saturday.
Capt. Troy Balcar of the San Antonio Fire Department said a family member found a sealed box with about 75 rounds of decades-old ammunition underneath the house. He said the rounds are .40 caliber and about 40 years old, based on a date written on the box. Half a dozen nearby homes were evacuated for about three hours.
“This is definitely a big danger, because they’ve been under there so long,” Balcar said. “They’ve rusted, they’ve been exposed to the weather, elements outside so we definitely want to get them disposed of as quickly as possible.”
Where do I even begin? That a Fire Chief would go on the record showing is ignorance about common ammunition or that somebody has a time machine and traveled back in time to deliver a box of .40 caliber ammunition 20 years before it was invented.
Hat Tip: Paul L.
This story is heartbreakingly ignorant.
a.the gov’t responders are playing up a political narrative that has zero basis in fact.
OR
b. they are too stupid to even retain their jobs and have little knowledge in their field to perform their duties.
Which is it?
As they say on the intertubes: embrace the healing power of ‘and’
when did brass and lead start to rust??
On second thought, I vote both.
40 year old .40? Yeah, right.
75 rounds? There’s probably that much in handloads lost on the floor of my basement lair.
So much fail in one confined space.
If they saw just what was loaded in the back of my pickup, they would fall over dead from heart failure. We quit counting it by round, we count it by weight. My personal stash is close to 10,000 rds and there’s over 1/2 ton in the truck. That’s until I finish loading for the gun show in two weeks. Then it will be a lot closer to 3/4 ton.
San Antonio, be ashamed of your police.
Well I’m finally able to comment again. My adblocker wasn’t liking word press for some reason.
Maybe the Paul Lathrop Defense Fund widget?
75 rounds? I went through more than that just yesterday at the range.
I had been trying to comment here and then I tried a couple of other places that use wordpress and was getting the same response so it probably wasn’t the widget. I couldn’t figure out exactly what it was, so I just whitelisted your site. I should’ve done that in the first damn place.
And the above comment was meant to be a direct reply to you Miguel and for whatever reason it didn’t work out that way.
The ammo was not identified specifically as .40 S&W. There are “40 caliber” rounds that existed prior to the .40 S&W.
Following through to the source, the article doesn’t say it was pistol ammunition, let alone that it was .40 S&W as seems to be the assumption. It could have been .401 SL, .405 Win, .38-40 or several others and still be .40 cal. As for clearing the neighborhood, I suspect it was a combination of training for the bomb squad and some fear mongering to justify budgets for the same.
I could see a precautionary evacuation of the neighbors if it was a box of 40 mm rounds… But .40 caliber?
That is what I thought at the beginning, but the Bomb Squad only staying for 30 minutes meant they were not dealing with explosives.
You are talking about Journalists, people that all rifles look like AK 47s and all pistols (including revolvers) look like Glocks. And they are going to go for that kind of nuance? Hanlon’s Razor applies.
I saw an article like this a number of years ago. Same thing with old small arms ammo found, bomb squad called, local area evacuated; it was in England. Now the stupid has reached as far as Texas. Smh
[…] Nearby houses evacuated because someone found 75 rounds of ammo. Evacuated because somebody doesn’t know anything about ammo. Shockingly, it was in Texas. […]
you want me to evacuate because you found 75 rounds of ammunition? are you stuck on stupid officer?
Are you kidding me? The police and fire are incompetent … anything in a box that’s 40 years old is smokeless powder it doesn’t become unstable over time and it actually becomes inert with contact with moisture. Realistically, the rounds could likely be cleaned up and fired if they were just surface oxidation. Danger my ass, this is a pathetically unstable world we’re living in, not because of the crazy shooters but because of the idiots who call police for a few boxes of ammunition and “emergency” services that display overt lack of training and experience and utter overt attention seeking over reactions.
There was NO danger at all wow … the pathetic nature of this reaction is disheartening to the future of our nation.
Just another over reaction to a situation.Just another sample of what our society has become.
That’s the equivalent of a Box and a Half of ammo. Since the 40 caliber was developed in the mid 80’s, it’s not over 40 years old, unless it was something like .38-40 Winchester or something like that. It’s no danger, especially being that old. It’s less of a danger if anything. Please, nobody tell these Einstein’s that WalMart has a Sporting Goods Dept whith hundreds of boxes of ammo. He’s probably call out the Strategic Air Command for a Nuclear Strike. What a dumbass.
Maybe you mean Oxams Razor the simplest explanation is usually the truest.
I have that is couch cushions. ………
In fkn *TEXAS*, no less!
wow…other than the shear wussification of America shown by this; the ignorance of the police/writer….the “40 caliber” round has not been around 40 yrs…more like 20….and there are very few “40” cowboy calibers…God help us.
Contrary to the opinion expressed here… .40 caliber existed for quite a while. .38-40 and .41 Magnum are only two that I mention.
Wow, Capt Balcar. As a fellow firefighter… you embarrass me. This is the most ignorant thing I’ve read or seen. I am truly amazed that you treated some absolutely benign antique ammo as if you had just found a nuclear warhead. The RP who called this in, the police & the fire department are idiots. That is, wow. I have no words. This country has reached a level of stupid that is unfathomable.
My impression is that by “practice 40 caliber ammunition” they may actually mean “practice 40mm ammunition” which would explain a lot, it’s not the media has any sort of track record of accuracy when reporting on firearms.
Friggin’ idiots. Absolutely no danger whatsoever, and these fools make a big deal out of it. Old ammo probably won’t fire anyway, especially if it has been exposed to the elements. Idiots.
It’s the wussificatiion of America. My grown adult office coworkers literally panic in fear when I pull out my Swiss Army knife to open an envelope and usually ask if I’m allowed to have that (at work).
I have to wonder if they just wanted to get the people out of those houses so that they could look around, or maybe install some cameras and microphones, without anyone getting suspicious.
I can’t believe that absolutely no one there had any sense.
OMFG The dumb is so strong in this one. FYI: Old spoilt gun ammo will at the very possible worst, just fizzle a little bit and that’s all.
Was most likely 40mm ammunition. So if it was then those are grenades. Unless it was practice ammo then its half grenade half orange chalk.
Now go ahead and investigate something a little further before you write this crap article like the whole world offends you.
“A contractor was replacing pipes on Saturday and found a case of practice explosives under the home.”
This was the second time that have been at this house, it was a former veteran. Deceased recently. Because they were practice explosives, my bet was that they look like 40 millimeter rounds, not 40 caliber.
Really ? I didn’t know brass and lead rusted
Based on this story, I am afraid these ass-hats would have every branch of the military out to my house if there were ever an issue. The sheep have become so scared that they are irrationally trying to stop the wolves and the watchdogs alike. And now, in their confusion, they even use the wolves against their protectors.
Geez! Surely this is not true? No one could be that stupid!
They could of just taken the gunpowder out of the rounds and thrown them in the garbage if they didn’t want them or hey they could of probably sold them.
Exact thought 40 years ago. Will that blow up a building ? Kill a person? Will it work in a pistola? Of course not!!!!!
My guess is that it is 44-40 Winchester/pistol ammo. It was some of the most common ammo going. That and the 45 Colt are the cartridges that won the west. These must be the most ignorant people on earth. The whole bunch of them, including the home owner. If these are the kind of fools that respond to situations, our country is in big trouble. The Chief or a police officer should have gone to the house and picked them up. Dispatching emergency vehicles was a waste and an abuse of taxpayer services.
Did they also test the paint used in the printing on the ammo boxes for lead? Probably should have cleared the entire city, then.
Was it single or double base powder? Single base, there wouldn’t be the slightest justif’n for treating it as explosive. Double base, OK, then the slightest justif’n.
What a maroooooon. This Fire whatever chief is playing the political game nothing more.. Idiot
[…] Gun Free Zone: […]
I’m at a loss of words. Soooo who wants to go to the range?
This is total crap reporting old rusting ammo isn’t going to just go boom and if it did the effect isn’t that dangerous, soldiers withdrawing from Korea had mountains of ammo they had to burn to keep from being used against them and they warmed themselves next to the fires. I know this for a fact as my mentor was a Korean sniper and he said it was the only heat available and the rounds had little energy to do any damage. People need to understand without a chamber a cartridge has little pressure build up so it ends up being much like a firecrackers ( no not a M80)
The .40 S&W cartridge debuted January 17, 1990
Seriously? All that for a couple of boxes of ammunition? The powder probably went bad years ago. SMH someone needs to lose their “Man Card” on this one.
As ignorant as these officials were, it could have been 44-40 ammo
When did Texas end up with gun paranoid idiots.
Showing is ignorance
75 rounds = 11/2 boxes. San Antonio doesn’t have enough to do.
OMG – Gun grabbers will go to INSANE lengths to further their cause. If anything, the older they are. the less likely they are to be dangerous. Gunpowder is not like dynamite. It degrades as it ages. What a bunch of idiots . . . .WOW!
Of course our news gets everything wrong it eas 85 rounds of 40mm grenades