Man finds "missile launcher" in his back-40

Drewva sez, " This guy just outside San Antonio was clearing some brush on his land and finds a discarded 'surface to air missile launcher.' Apparently he called up all the federal agencies to come and pick it up and they couldn't decide what to do."

My first thought was abandoned LARP-prop, but that seems unlikely.

"I had never seen it before," said Schule, a 34-year-old Web developer. "I looked at it, and it kind of looked like a missile launcher."
Schule took a closer look. It was a long, forest-green metal tube. A decal on it read: "Guided Missile and Launcher, Surface Attack."
The discovery was the start of a surreal journey for Schule. Somehow, an unarmed anti-tank weapon -- or a very good fake -- wound up on his land at Beck Road and Kirk Lane in the Hill Country, miles away from a military installation.

Man finds missile launcher in Comal County (Thanks, Drewva!)

I write books. My latest is a YA science fiction novel called Homeland (it's the sequel to Little Brother). More books: Rapture of the Nerds (a novel, with Charlie Stross); With a Little Help (short stories); and The Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow (novella and nonfic). I speak all over the place and I tweet and tumble, too.

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The Chemist

Other posters here are overreacting to his actually-very-reasonable reaction.

1. Man finds piece of military hardware in his yard.
2. Man does not know the first thing about what it is or how harmless it is, or how it got on his property. To him it just looks vaguely ominous.
3. Man does what seems reasonable considering the circumstances and calls authorities.
4. Reporter gets wind of this, and does a write-up because even if it’s not hair-raising, it’s kind of interesting on a slow news day anyway.

I also fail to see how this “reeks of left-wing fear mongering” or how the story itself was in any way inaccurate or exaggerated.
VagabondAstronomer

Somebody mentioned Estes…
About fourteen years ago, in rural Alabama, a farm family found a rocket on the roof of their barn. They went up to investigate, and found Air Force markings on it, and immediately called the local authorities. An investigation began.
Where did this missile come from?
What sort of ordinance was it?
Why so small?
It didn’t hit anybody that it had a cardboard tube, plastic nose and tail cone, and balsa fins.
It was an Estes Bullpup.
Still, pretty cool find for this guy. Doubt I’d have called anybody (it is spent, after all), though I’d have been tempted to show up at a Republican political rally with it (and no doubt received a lifetime membership to Club Fed for my effort).
Anonymous

It’s an empty tube, not a missile launcher. The Javelin comes in two parts, the missile tube (which is discarded after launch) and the CLU (command/launch unit) which has the optics and interfaces with the missile.

The CLU attached to the tube to launch, then detached and reused again and again. The empty fiberglass tube is tossed and contains nothing of danger or value.
Moriarty

It’s nice to live in a country where finding such military detritus is newsworthy.
demidan

I got a rock.
theawesomerobot

Wow Chip, you’re getting a bit too concerned about an inert tube here. This sits right below pointy stick on the list of things for the military to be worried about.
- danlalan
  
  To be fair, it depends entirely on how long the pointy stick is…
Anonymous

Well, yellow is used to indicate “contains high explosive” Which this tube DID, before the missile was launched. Light blue is the color used to mark inert or training ammunition. The tube is basicly the container that the missile comes in. You attatch the seprate sight unit and remove the cap to fire the missile. Then you discard the tube. This is really no different than one of those .50 cal ammo cans. If you find an empty one, no big deal. If you were to find a full one, the authorities would be VERY INTERESTED.
igpajo

“Read the basis for this article DAYS ago – thanks for your condescension and derision, oh master of milspec logistical prowess and internet etiquette.

You’re Welcome!

“I suppose that if I wish to continue our discussion offline, I should mail you at the Army Public Affairs office…”

LMFAO! Not even close.
Jack Daniel

This guy just won the Halloween lottery.
Santa’s Knee

The part that has me “ba-rooing” is not so much that the man found a firing tube (even though it is kinda odd), but the fact that it had a National Stock Number on it and noone could find the audit trail for it…
Anonymous

What kind of a loser turns something like this into the Feds?
Anonymous

nub should sell it, that things worth 125k on wiki?
Anonymous

The yellow stripe means it was a live round (before it was fired). An inert round would be marked with baby blue. And yes, we often covered the yellow markings with green speed tape so they wouldn’t be quite so visible.
Anonymous

The NSN is not the individual serial number of a piece of equipment, just the number you use to order it from supply. It would be the same one on EVERY one of these manufactured.
kgiesler

Talk about backyard treasure! Although it might be a little scary to find a missile launcher in your backyard, what a story to tell years down the road. I’m curious to hear the explanation for how it ended up there…
Anonymous

Wow: those Javelin missle launches look fun. I fired the dragon when it was first introduced into the European Theatre circa 1978 and that thing was a bitch. Much worse than the 109 mm recoiless which blew rocks up your nose. The dragon was a fly by wire missle that enveloped you in a ball of flame on launch and needed to be kept on target until impact. The thing burned my eyebrows off and I nearly threw it on the ground before bringing the missle back on target. Looking at the videos, the Dragaon missle was much slower than the Javelin: you could definetly watch the Dragon go down range which I suppose would be really scarry if you were the unlucky target. On the flip side, a Dragon launch was highly visible which subjected the lauchch site to suppressing fire. Looks like they’ve come a long way. BTW, that does not look like a Dragon tube to me.

As to the hype, it just seems over the top to me. Might as well work yourself up over some ammo boxes.
Anonymous

apreche–

“I’m just curious, if the tube is solid and stupid, how do you tell the missile inside to launch?”

Let’s figure this one out. The tube WITH the missile weighs thirty pounds. The tube WITHOUT the missile weighs five pounds. When you try to look through the tube WITH the missile, your vision path is strangely blocked because there’s a freakin’ MISSILE in there. When you look though a tube WITHOUT a missile, you can see from one end to the other, just like the tube that paper towels come on, except a bit bigger and sturdier. These facts are called “clues”.

Santa’s Knee:

The NSN is just a catalog number. Everything in the government stores inventory from tanks to toilet paper has one. You don’t track NSN’s, you track serial numbers. Once the missile is fired, the launch tube is a piece of disposable trash.

Time was, folks, that everyone knew a veteran with whom these things could be discussed and facts would come out. Now, veterans are relatively rare and “Like, oooooh, he’s a VETERAN. You don’t want to talk to him. He’s like a trained killer with mental issues an’ everything.” Instead, we “rely” on “knowledgeable journalists” (an oxymoron, heavy on the “moron”) to tell us the news and how we should respond.
- devophill
  
  “apreche–
  
  “I’m just curious, if the tube is solid and stupid, how do you tell the missile inside to launch?”
  
  Let’s figure this one out. The tube WITH the missile weighs thirty pounds. The tube WITHOUT the missile weighs five pounds. When you try to look through the tube WITH the missile, your vision path is strangely blocked because there’s a freakin’ MISSILE in there. When you look though a tube WITHOUT a missile, you can see from one end to the other, just like the tube that paper towels come on, except a bit bigger and sturdier. These facts are called “clues”.
  
  Anon @8:16- You read that wrong, smart guy. Apreche wasn’t asking “how do you tell IF the missile IS inside to launch”, it was “how do you tell the missile inside to launch” i.e., where’s the trigger. Obviously, that question has since been answered.
Anonymous

way to represent UT Drewva!
and yeah it is an at4
SaulTSack

Definitely an M47 Dragon tube – you can tell by the bipod mount on the front and the guidance mount across the top. And yes – you can still find crap like that and more in your local surplus store… to include empty LAW tubes, AT4 tubes, etc. They’re no more dangerous than a big piece of PVC pipe.
RedShirt77

@flink

“It’s just as serious as someone “losing” the tube from an empty roll of paper towels.”

again, why is it so hard to understand that they aren’t dropping empty tubes from airplanes and people aren’t carrying empty tubes int he middle of the woods.
chip

I said our national security priorities are fucked, and I stand by that. Sure, this is just an empty tube NOW, but it had several pounds of high explosives and rocket propellant in it at some point. Maybe (probably) it was used in training or properly disarmed, but then again, maybe it wasn’t.

You can’t buy a proper children’s chemistry set any more because every last gram of potentially hazardous chemicals must be accounted for. You can’t buy fertilizer without a background check. You can’t get on an airplane with more than a few ounces of liquid or a sharp looking nail file. There are any number of rules to “protect” us from things which have legitimate, non-dangerous uses and are extremely unlikely to cause harm.

Yet when somebody finds the remains of a device which can ONLY be used to blow shit up, nobody seems to know or even care where it came from or what happened to the dangerous bits. It’s a classic example of “penny smart, pound foolish”.

Had this guy been pulled over with the tube in his truck as he feared, you better believe there would have been trouble. The cop, high on the prospect of catching a “terrorist”, would have surely taken him into custody and called the FBI and/or DHS. This guy would have spent at least a day or two in jail, and in almost certainly would have had his home searched.

But because he volunteered to give it up, it’s no longer exciting. The same local police force couldn’t be bothered to look into it because there’s no chance of getting their pictures in the paper. The potential threat is still the same – someone still may or may not have a live anti-tank rocket – but the reaction is different because the perceived importance/threat/chance-for-glory is lower.

That is what I meant in my first post. I did not say “ZOMG missiles!!!1!!” I simply stated that law enforcement agencies should show a little more interest in real potential threats and a lot less interest in non-threats.
Anonymous

That is a Dragon not a javelin. I fired dragons and SMAW rocket launchers for the marines.
toxonix

That thing is useless without the missile and tracking optics.
Especially the missile.
GlenBlank

OMG THIS WAS A SERIOUS THREAT TO PUBLIC SAFETY!!!

At any moment, some clueless civilian could have stumbled across it and died of a heart attack resulting from unreasoning fear of the unfamiliar!
Anonymous

anon 6:35 and of course you COULD set up a milan or dragon in such a way that it was firing over a wall that you were hiding behind. With the Dragon, not so much
Darren Garrison

I used to see those disposable rocket thingies (but I think a different type– I don’t remember them having a large base) for sale alongside ammo containers, surplus boots and coats, and defused “pineapple” grenade at a local flea market almost every week. Don’t know if they still sell now in our post-9/11 world, but at the time I was seeing them they were just a novelty item.
The Late Dentarthurdent

I remember back in the 1980s, our week-long summer Boy Scout camp included a several-day war game. We had lots of fun running around in the woods, fording streams, thinking we were action heroes. A little militaristic perhaps, but mostly it was an excuse to make our hiking, climbing, and canoeing a little more thrilling.

One prop some of us carried around was an old LAW missile tube. These were available from most army surplus stores. Basically, it was a metal tube within a metal tube, with iron sights on the top and a firing button. Needless to say, there was no missile inside, or any actual working firing mechanism.

My point is, this was not some exclusive military hardware which terrorists were itching to get their hands on. It was disposable, a piece of scrap. In these post 9/11 days, the authorities would probably frown on a bunch of 14-year olds carrying around something like that in the woods. But finding one on your property isn’t proof of the incompetence of the security industrial complex or anything (lots of other things prove that), at least here in Canada.
- Santa’s Knee
  
  “But finding one on your property isn’t proof of the incompetence of the security industrial complex or anything (lots of other things prove that), at least here in Canada.”
  
  Asking them to find out where it came from by supplying the serial number and having them come up empty *is* (I can’t speak for Canada)…
Anonymous

Lot’s just say, for the sake of argument, that someone did carry this tube out into the woods and fired it. Two big questions.

1. Where’s the story about the big whole in the ground where the ordinance actually landed?

2. Who’s stupid enough to leave this kind of evidence lying around after they fire of an anti-tank missile? The only reason to fire and drop is that you are supposed to be in possession of the thing to begin with. Otherwise, you’re just asking to be discovered.
Anonymous

Come and get your damn tube off my yard, that’s what I say.
Anonymous

Posting anon for (hopefully) obvious reasons.

I once found a cardboard tube in an office building stairwell that contained complete blueprints for a nuclear weapon storage facility. The prints included all sorts of details like the address of the facility, the minimum distance that warheads could be from each other without risking critical mass creation if the shielding were to be damaged, etc. This was during Clinton, I think, or possibly Bush I.

Weirder yet, I found this tube next to a lot of stuff that was left behind when a company that ran some sort of privatized incarceration services for the US fedguv moved out. I don’t know for sure that these things were connected, it could have been a random coincidence, but it was still weird.

I got kind of spooked by the whole thing, so I arranged with a friendly active duty Navy officer to have the prints mysteriously appear (along with a note explaining where they’d been found) on a desk in a Navy Intelligence office. Never heard anything more about it, and my friend has since retired (she didn’t like what she saw at Gitmo and left the service).

Not expecting anyone to believe this, and certainly not going to offer any more information! I like my thumbs without screws in ‘em.

And hell, no, I didn’t make any copies.
- danlalan
  
  Posting anon for (hopefully) obvious reasons.
  
  Not to be a downer, but unless you have taken some fairly robust steps to keep where you are connected to the internet untraceable to you (like using a strangers unencrypted wifi), making an anonymous post will not stop the powers that be from finding you if they really want to. If you really have information that you are afraid will cause you grief if the wrong people find out you have it, putting it on boing boing or anywhere else is probably not the wisest move a person could make, anonymous posting or not….
igpajo

I get the feeling a lot of the people posting here aren’t reading the linked to article. The military is not ignoring the issue. They haven’t come up “empty handed” as Santa’s Knee said. There is an investigation into the chain of custody of the thing. To quote the article…:
————-
“Military officials were unable to say Wednesday who last had the launcher and when it was lost. The launcher has a serial number that can be used to track the chain of custody. That will be part of the militaryâ€™s investigation, said Phil Reidinger, spokesman for Fort Sam.

At Schuleâ€™s house, he and the Army investigator had to wait for about three more hours for an ordnance disposal team from Lackland AFB to confiscate the weapon.”
————–

Had it been an armed device I’m sure the response would have been a lot more immediate. But the fact that it was just a launcher tube explains why it might have taken a day or two to get someone on it. The military is usually pretty behind the times when it comes to record keeping so it’s probably a process that will take some time. And it’s likely they won’t ever make public what they find out.
Bottom Line people…Read the article before commenting on stuff like this. Kind of silly to argue about things when your just reading the comments and not reading the article.
- Santa’s Knee
  
  “Military officials were unable to say Wednesday who last had the launcher and when it was lost.”
  
  Do I really need to say it…?
- Santa’s Knee
  
  Had it been an armed device I’m sure the response would have been a lot more immediate. But the fact that it was just a launcher tube explains why it might have taken a day or two to get someone on it. The military is usually pretty behind the times when it comes to record keeping so it’s probably a process that will take some time. And it’s likely they won’t ever make public what they find out.
  Bottom Line people…Read the article before commenting on stuff like this. Kind of silly to argue about things when your just reading the comments and not reading the article.”
  
  Read the basis for this article DAYS ago – thanks for your condescension and derision, oh master of milspec logistical prowess and internet etiquette.
  
  I suppose that if I wish to continue our discussion offline, I should mail you at the Army Public Affairs office…
Anonymous

Problem with the annoying neighbor: Solved
;)
Anonymous

Except it was probably fired SOMEWHERE withing the United States by persons unknown.

That should bother some folks.

Well it was PROBABLY fired by soldiers during a training exercise. Then this disposable piece of packaging was disposed of, either by throwing it away or selling to a surplus store. Somebody bought the tube and then lost it in the woods. That’s MUCH more likely than the idea that somebody stole a LIVE round and then fired it off for shits and grins in the woods.
Anonymous

It’s ok, he just found part of the Internet. As we all know, it’s a series of tubes, NOT A TRUCK!
gollux

Hell, I’da just stuck it out on my front porch. The guy down the highway has a couple training dummy iron bombs as driveway markers. I could one-up him if I had a pair.
ValuedRug

What about the CHILDREN!??

What a joke, c’mon guys. This should be a quirky story about finding something cool in the woods. You know, like when you were a kid? No? Maybe yall should get out into the woods more often. The fear of the unknown is strong with you.
Dewi Morgan

If the yellow line really does mean “deactivated/prop” (which fits with what I’ve seen, and with the obvious fact that putting bright yellow on it kinda mucks up the point of the camouflage) then everyone trying to drum up hysteria about “zomg but where did the missile go???” is kinda missing the point.

No missile was *in* there when the person who discarded it obtained the tube. Either the tube was used initially for training and never held a round, or the tube was repurposed after firing into a training tool, or was sold to some military surplus store.
- arkizzle / Moderator
  
  Dewi,
  
  This one has a yellow stripe. It isn’t a training prop.
  
  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uY5HjEYwxYU
  
  So does this one, and it isn’t either:
  
  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D35iEJLIyEw#t=1m00s
  - danlalan
    
    I can’t speak for army ordinance, but for naval ordinance blue stripes indicate training rounds, and yellow stripes indicate live ones…
  - Dewi Morgan
    
    Good catch! Now I look silly but it serves me right for believing an anon commenter!
    
    Er… I mean “those clearly aren’t real rockets, they were shopped in afterwards. I can tell by some of the pixels, and having seen many a photoshop in my time.”
Anonymous

I don’t think it’s an AT-4 Rocket Launcher. The round part at the extremity of the tube make me think it’s a Javelin Launcher.
Talia

Not even the woods are safe these days. We need to make a law banning children from the Great Outdoors. For their own good. THEIR OWN GOOD!
- Omir the Storyteller
  
  Between Cartoon Network, Xbox and “ZOMG there are stalkers waiting around every corner just waiting to kidnap our kids” we’ve already pretty well taken care of that. :(
Anonymous

Thats a Javelin missile tube not an AT4. Its fired from a CLU or Command Launch Unit that uses imagery to guide the missile onto its target.
Anonymous

It’s not surface to air, it’s the launch case from an anti-tank missile – an AT4 by the looks of it.

http://www.fas.org/man/dod-101/sys/land/at4.htm

Basically, what he’s holding there is just a green fibreglass tube with some nifty writing on it. He probably shouldn’t be finding them in his back yard, though …
coaxial

It’s not a “surface to air” missle. It’s an anti-tank missile. Specifically an FGM 148 Javelin. Please correct the write up. It’s very annoying that not only is it wrong, but that the pull quote contradicts the writeup.
- Anonymous
  
  It’s a Dragon, not a Javelin. older version.
mastercontroller

Dude.

That’s right down the road from me.

Some people have all the luck.
nixiebunny

The Wikipedia page referenced above calls this part the “disposable launch tube”. Not much of a threat, as far as I can tell.

It’s basically a fancy metal tube. All the burny stuff is built into the missile itself. So it’s no wonder that the military wasn’t too excited about it.
Anonymous

Typically the yellow painted strip is used to indicate an empty shell or mock-up for training purpose. These are often found from military surplus stores etc.
- Anonymous
  
  Actually yellow bands mean High Explosives (the main charge) and the Brown band towards the base means Low Explosives (the propellant).
chip

@coaxial: According to the article, it’s a “Dragon” launcher – the predecessor to the Javelin. You’re right about the anti-tank part though.

Honestly, this just goes to show how well and truly fucked our national security priorities are. Government agencies trip over themselves to spend hundreds of billions on security measures that do absolutely nothing. Meanwhile, they completely ignore things that actually DO pose a public threat. The lack of concern from the various police and military agencies this guy contacted is bad, but the fact that nobody even KNEW that a missile launcher was missing is far worse.

I know things like airport security theater makes people FEEL safer, but I’d prefer that we spent our efforts on things that make us ACTUALLY safer. “Missile launcher inventory control” seems like a good place to start.
- mdh
  
  this just goes to show how well and truly fucked our national security priorities are
  
  a bit of hyperbole there. it’s just a dumb tube. All the smart parts are in the missile. I believe you can get these at surplus stores because they’re not re-used.
  - RedShirt77
    
    @ mdh
    
    “a bit of hyperbole there. it’s just a dumb tube.”
    
    You think someone walked an empty tube into the middle of the woods?
    
    Most likely this is the thievery of a reservist that stole it and shot off the guided missile and just dropped the tube. That crime should be investigated.
    
    The bigger concern that should be investigated was that this was a terrorist testing a weapon planned to be used at an airport or in rush hour or some such thing.
Phikus

Dude, I could make a wicked bong out of that thing…
ihabime

@chip: The tube is meant to be discarded, it’s made of fiberglass. All the expensive bits are in the missile and the detachable day/night sights, which this doesn’t include. There’s no danger or fucked up national security priorities involved.

You can buy used missile launch tubes at military surplus stores.
ackpht

It’s not even a metal tube- it’s fiberglass. A fiberglass tube with rubber bumpers and a folding bipod. No explosives, no secrets, no threat, no story.
- InsertFingerHere
  
  Except it was probably fired SOMEWHERE withing the United States by persons unknown.
  
  That should bother some folks.
  - mdh
    
    that should bother some folks
    
    yes, it is likely to trip all sorts of levers amongst the paranoid among us.
igpajo

Just a thought, but I’m wondering if he’s near any practice jump zones. When I was in the military I was airborne and I remember seeing members of the 82nd jumping with the Dragon launchers strapped onto their packs. Could be this thing wasn’t secured the way it should be and fell off one of those troops. They certainly don’t jump with live ammo so it’s likely they’d just jump with an empty tube. Even if they don’t jump near his property, the first jumpers stand in the door for a good 30 seconds or a minute before jumping out. Could have fallen off as the guy stepped up to the door into the wind. In fact I was on the ground once during a practice night jump and the 82nd was jumping right behind us on the same DZ and one of these things fell about 30 feet away from me.
But I agree, there’s nothing dangerous or classified about this. Just a tube.
Anonymous

It’s an empty tube. You used to be able to buy these at almost any Army Surplus store in Canada.
desprez

Chip is correct, it is the M47 Dragon launching tube.
desprez

As a side note, ATGMs like this fire nothing like as depicted by Hollywood. Which is strange because the action is really quite fascinating in its own right.
Some Javelin launch clips from YouTube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SKfW0CIQ6W8
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uY5HjEYwxYU
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D35iEJLIyEw
The last clip describes more in detail.
Sam

Send him to Guantanamo for questioning!
WalterBillington

Eek! A cardboard tube! Did this guy put his son “in” a canoe, push him down the rapids and call the news station? Estes rockets pose a bigger threat.

I think he deserves a trip to Slovenia for a little mine clearance. Then he can worry about what’s in people’s backyards.
J.C. Pelzer (former Marine Corps Dragon gunner)

That’s an expended (used and empty) launch tube from an M-47 Dragon anti-tank missile. It was used back in the 60′s – 90′s by specialized infantrymen in the Army and Marine Corps to destroy tanks and armored vehicles. It’s obsolete now, replaced by the Javelin missile system. Most likely some former Dragon gunner kept the launch tube as a souvenir from a day at the range (not a totally uncommon practice) and then either lost it or threw it away. The tube is totally harmless without the missile, no different than a piece of empty brass from a bullet.
rancor01

Agree with most other posters here.. This is a non-story. I’ve seen these fiberglass tubes for sale at surplus stores and gun shows for 20+ years now. They run about $60.00 to $80.00. They’re absolutely useless and have no electronic parts attached. Its just fiberglass and rubber.
Reeks of left-wing fear mongering.. Those guns!! They need to be controlled! See!! SEE?!?!
- Talia
  
  Congrats on being the first to drag politics into a competely unrelated thread. Perhaps you’d also like to mention “You know who ELSE had disposable launch tubes?” since the thread hasn’t been Godwinned yet.
  
  Hey, as long as you’re going for competely offbase trollery, might as well go all the way.
- mdh
  
  rancor – this does not “reek of left wing fearmongering”. Go re-read the post and fine me one piece of hyperbole in the presentation here.
  
  If still you truly believe it does, then you might want to watch a little less Glen Beck (a.k.a. Chicken Little)
Kevin Kenny

Now that he’s gone to the press about it, watch someone try to punish him for having it. Because he’s broken one of the real laws: Never Embarrass the Powerful.
- flink
  
  Who is embarrassed? It’s an empty fiberglass tube.
  
  They seemed to “ignore” him because it’s a non-issue. It’s just as serious as someone “losing” the tube from an empty roll of paper towels.
Apreche

I understand that it’s just a stupid tube. I’m just curious, if the tube is solid and stupid, how do you tell the missile inside to launch? Does the tube have a hole in it through which you can push the launch button or something like that? Is there a wireless remote that comes with the missile?
Anonymous

I wonder how many guys in San Antonio are going to clear their backyard this weekend hoping to find more military surplus supplies.
Anonymous

This item did once contain a live projectile/missile. The yellow band indicates that it contained High Explosive (HE). So your first reaction (could have been your last) should have been not to mess with it but since it is basically a Hollow Launching tube, no biggee. A training item would have been marked with either a Blue Band or Gold Band. Nice conversation piece. I don’t recommend parading that bullshit around if it looked like a grenade, artillery round… or it may definately fuck up your weekend