December 9, 2004

World War II bazooka found in San Jose garage

By Carol Rosen
Staff Writer

There was excitement and a little bit of fear on the 500 block of Minnesota Avenue on Friday, Dec. 3 as the San Jose Police Department’s bomb squad evacuated a bazooka shell from a garage on the street.

A robot is being unloaded out of the bomb tech’s vehicle to carry the bazooka to the bomb disposal banister.

The street was closed and evacuated for about an hour and no one was arrested or cited. However, the bomb squad’s robot dropped the shell three times before it got into the container—there were no explosions.

It all started out as a quiet, normal Friday. The house is inhabited by Times’ graphic artist Jamie Eidschun, his wife Jena and their 3-month-old son Ryan. Both the elder Eidschuns were at work and Jamie’s parents were babysitting. Steve Eidschun was in the garage working on the restoration of Jamie’s 1954 Chevy Belair.

“Dad was doing some bondo work and decided to snoop around in one of the cabinets while the bondo was drying [on the Chevy]. He opened up a cabinet that had an old toolbox in it. When he pulled the toolbox out, he noticed what appeared to be an old shell from a World War II bazooka,” said Jamie.

“When he picked the shell up he noticed that the warhead was loose so he unscrewed it. After unscrewing the head off, the warhead started to get cold and frosty. He realized something was wrong so he screwed the head back on and put it back in the cabinet.”

At that point, Steve decided to call 311 and Jamie. He took off from work and headed home where he found his father in the garage and pointed out the bazooka to him.

The robot drops the WWII RPG into the banister. Photos by Jamie Eidschun

“I couldn’t believe it,” Jamie said. “I expected to see a small rifle shell, but this thing was about two feet long. It looked like something you see our troops in Iraq firing off on the nightly news.”

When the police arrived, they told the family to take the baby and themselves out to the front yard. Then they started asking questions such as, how did Steve find the shell, what division Jena’s grandfather served in during the war and when he passed away?

They sent a robot into the garage to fetch the bazooka. That was when the police indicated that all the people, including the Eidschuns, needed to go inside. “They told us anyone who came out before the scene was clear would be arrested. It took them about an hour to get the explosive out of the garage and into the banister,” Jamie said.

Once they had the bazooka in the container and drove it away, they allowed the Eidschuns and their neighbors to come outside.

“The officer said that the shell had some residue left inside of it, but the robot dropped it three times, so there was an indication the bazooka was disarmed. However, they wouldn’t know for sure because they would take it out somewhere in an unpopulated area and blow it up,” Jamie said.

In fact, there was little fallout from the episode. However, on Dec. 5, when the Eidschuns held a garage sale, quite a few neighbors came over to ask if the couple was selling any bazooka rounds!