From the tropical shores of Florida to the Neandertal Valley of Germany, a fisherman and a 40-year-old woman recently stumbled upon American-made munitions separated not only by great distances but also completely different eras of warfare.

 

The Florida story began 60 miles off shore from Panama City, where the fishing trawler Bold Venture came up with quite a catch in its net: an 8-foot-long, Aim-9 Sidewinder air-to-air missile. Thinking he had snagged a heck of a souvenir, the boat’s captain, Rodney Prudo, left the missile on the roof of his vessel and continued with his two-week-long fishing expedition, without notifying local authorities about the weapon until he docked on Monday. Local sheriffs and U.S. military officials weren’t too happy with Prudo’s decision to bring the missile back into a populated area, with one officer reportedly calling him a “knucklehead.”

 

U.S. Air Force officials said the Sidewinder was not armed, and had been launched over the Gulf of Mexico five years ago as part of a test to check the missile’s propulsion system. It was supposed to have been recovered, but wasn’t. The military admonished Prudo, telling him to leave unexploded ordinances in the sea if he comes across anymore in the future. This is entirely quite possible, as the military uses a large portion of the Gulf as a test range.

 

Prudo said he came across a second missile during his 14 days at sea—one that looked newer and more sophisticated than the Sidewinder. He claims to have let that one slip back into the sea, thinking it was armed because it was “still beeping.” The Air Force said it knew nothing about the newer missile caught by Prudo, and speculated that problem belonged to another branch of the armed forces.

 

Meanwhile, in Germany on Monday, a woman walking her two dogs came across a World War II-era hand grenade, made in the USA. The woman’s boxer, named Boogie, discovered the still-armed explosive near the town of Erkrath, located in a rural area of North Rhine-Westphalia. German officials said it’s not uncommon for locals all over the country to still come across old bombs buried in the ground, sometimes as often as once or twice a month. A local policeman, Ulrich Löhe, said many American soldiers “tossed their weapons aside in the area as the war ended and they made their way home.”

-Noel Brinkerhoff

 

Fish Tale: Turns Out That Missile Was Not Explosive After All (by Peter Bernard, New Channel 8-Tampa Bay)

Fisherman Laments Losing Sidewinder 'Souvenir'; Air Force Says Missile Found Monday Wasn't Armed (by Jamal Thalji, Brant James and Emily Nipps, St. Petersburg Times)

Dog Fetches Live WWII Grenade (by Kristen Allen, The Local-Berlin)