SJAFB EOD explodes found dynamite
By Joey Pitchford
Published in News on December 26, 2016 5:31 PM
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News-Argus/CASEY MOZINGO
Ryan Herring from Thoroughfare Volunteer Fire Department directs traffic Monday at the intersection of U.S. 13 South and Herring Road. The Wayne County Sheriff's Office and the Seymour Johnson Explosive Ordnance Disposal team responded to Herring's Mill where between 75 and 100 sticks of dynamite was found in a storage building. Homes were evacuated with the dynamite was safely detonated.
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News-Argus/CASEY MOZINGO
Ken Womble, left, and Joe Tucker from Thoroughfare Volunteer Fire Department direct traffic Monday at the intersection of U.S. 13 South and Herring Road. The Wayne County Sheriff's Office and the Seymour Johnson Explosive Ordnance Disposal team responded to Herring's Mill where between 75 and 100 sticks of dynamite was found in a storage building. Homes were evacuated with the dynamite was safely detonated.
Wayne County Sheriff's deputies evacuated the southern Wayne County community of Wingspread Monday afternoon after a local farmer found between 75 and 100 sticks of dynamite in the old Herring Mill building off of U.S. 13.
Sheriff Larry Pierce said that the man had recently purchased the building and was cleaning it out when he found the explosives. By around 1 p.m., deputies had set up roadblocks around the area, turning back everyone who tried to enter while allowing residents to leave.
Everyone within a quarter mile of the building was evacuated, although Pierce said they were not told to go anywhere specific but to wait for the all-clear.
Lori Dennis ---- along with her husband and the three young children they were baby-sitting for a friend ---- decided to go to the Thoroughfare Fire Department just down the road from one of the roadblocks. Mrs. Dennis was not home when the evacuations began, but was on her way there when told they were underway.
"We were just out getting lunch in Mount Olive, and we came back and were told we couldn't go home," she said, turning to quiet the crying two-year-old she was caring for. "It's nap time for this one."
Thinking the process would be a quick one, Mrs. Dennis had originally planned to wait at the fire department until the all-clear. However, Pierce said at the time that the process would be a slow one, so Mrs. Dennis decided instead to go to Middlesex, where her mother lives.
All of the families in the evacuation zone had been cleared out by just after 2 p.m. The Seymour Johnson Air Force Base Explosive Ordinance Disposal team was called out to deal with the dynamite ---- typically done through a controlled detonation.
SJAFB public affairs officer Lt. Michele Fletcher said that, in situations like this one, standard protocol is for the Sheriff's office to secure the area by evacuating at-risk residents and setting up roadblocks around a designated perimeter. They then request the EOD team from SJAFB, who determines how to best get rid of the explosives.
"Their number one priority is to be as safe as possible," Ms. Fletcher said. "They will either detonate the explosives there at the site or bring them back to the base, whichever one is safer."
By 4:40 p.m., Pierce said the EOD team had removed the dynamite from the Herring Mill building, and had dug a pit in a field adjacent to the building in which to place the explosives.
The team detonated the explosives at around 5:15 p.m. Pierce said that the detonation went off without any trouble, and that all evacuated residents are now clear to return to their homes.
Residents as far away as Pikeville and Fremont took to social media soon after the detonation, some saying they heard two explosions, others saying the felt them.