Explosive surprise found by consignment shop employees

WESTMORELAND, N.Y. -- Authorities say employees at a central New York consignment shop found a live World War II-vintage hand grenade as they unpacked a box of items from a building contents sale.

“We bought the contents of an old estate, and at the bottom of a bucket was a grenade,’’ Bill Trexler, owner of Cool Stuff Consignment shop, told The [Syracuse] Post-Standard. “When we found it, we didn’t know what to do. We just stared at each other like, ‘What do we do now?”’

Oneida County Sheriff Robert Maciol says deputies were called to the shop in the town of Westmoreland Thursday to check out the grenade, which employees had taken to a safe location outside.

The sheriff says the grenade was believed to be a 1930s to 1940s vintage, and the safety pin, spoon and original fuse appeared to be intact.

The State Police Bomb Disposal Unit deemed the grenade to be live and removed it for detonation.