The Bomb Squad - Stories for my Grandchildren

While going through some old documents recently, I came across a note that reminded me of the evening we the encounterd the local bomb squad. Here's the tale:

A number of years ago we were car shopping, and after several trips to several dealers, we decided to go with an offer from Howdy Honda. They didn't have a car on the lot configured exactly like we wanted, so they were bringing in a vehicle from another dealership, and it would be later in the day before everything was ready, so just to be sure we set the time for the closing at 7pm.

After supper, Barb and I drove back to south Austin, and as we got close, we saw lots and lots of flashing red and blue lights. Now, you don't like to see an EMS unit in front of the place of business you are destined for, and you get even more concerned when you see a bunch of cop cars there, and of course it's almost expected that there will also be a fire truck or two, but thankfully we didn't notice the bomb squad vehicles until we got inside the dealership!

The salesman greeted us and said "No problems. I moved your car to the other side of the building while the bomb squad disposes of the bomb the police found inside of the stolen car in our service driveway." And sure enough, there is a guy walking around outside in some industrial-strength padding, and a little red trailer with a heavily armored canister mounted on it, and guys with portable x-ray equipment taking pictures of whatever is in the trunk of this car!

I'm like, "We can do this tomorrow - no problem. Yes, why don't we come back in a few days - if there is a car left."  The salesman assures us everything is okay - we'll do the closing in an office on the far side of all the activity.

It seems the deal is, a kid came in with a car with the steering column broken. He said that his car had been stolen (the broken column) but the police recovered it and he needed to leave it to get it repaired. The service manager checks and finds out he has to order parts, but he didn't get a phone number for the guy, so he looks in the checkbook that's lying in the front seat and calls that phone number and the people say, "We don't have a car like that. How did you get our number?" The manager says from the check book in the car, and they say, "That check book was stolen - call the cops."

The cops came, and checked the out car and found a big, heavy, suspicious-looking plastic PVC pipe all wrapped in duct tape in the trunk - so they called in the bomb squad! We got there about the time the bomb squad x-rayed the pipe and saw that there were wires and batteries and stuff in it, so they wrapped the pipe in lead blankets and gingerly hoisted everything into the canister on the trailer and clamped the lid down tight. At this point, one might think that they would haul it off and do something remotely, but no! Standard procedure apparently is to set off an explosion inside the canister to detonate the bomb - while parked in the driveway of an all-glass building surrounded by dozens of new cars! I am not making this up!

They set off the detonation (while we were signing the papers) and it sounded like a very heavy metal object - oh, say, a car engine block - being dropped on a concrete floor. You sort of felt it before you heard it. At that point they opened up the canister and dug out what was left and determined that they had very definitely ruined a battery-operated fluorescent shop lamp.