An inactive bomb was recovered last week in a rural Randolph County home, according to the sheriff’s office.
Randolph County Sheriff Kevin Bell said he received an anonymous tip on the evening of Aug. 1 from a “concerned citizen” about a bomb located in a resident’s house in an unspecified part of the northeast Arkansas county.
Bell said officials served a search warrant to the resident early on the afternoon of Aug. 2 and located “what appeared to be a homemade, explosive device.”
“It had a glass jar filled with an unknown substance, with an electric capacitor with electrical wires coming out of that,” Bell said. “The top part of it was wrapped in aluminum foil and it was zip-tied to a small, propane bottle, like a camp-fuel propane bottle, and it appeared that they were all connected with electrical wires and had a fuse material coming out of the top as a detonation device.”
Bell said he called the Arkansas State Police Bomb Squad due to his “limited training in explosive devices like that,” adding that it was his first encounter with a bomb in his 24-year career.
The bomb squad X-rayed the device, and Bell said the squad determined that the bomb was inactive and was not in danger of exploding.
Officials confiscated the item, dismantled it, and still have it in evidence, according to Bell.
The sheriff said the investigation is pending, which is why details about who made the bomb and where haven’t been released.
Bell commended the person who called authorities to investigate the bomb, and he asked other people to call the police if they encounter a dangerous device.
“Evacuate the area around it and contact law enforcement so we can get the necessary resources in there to check it out and see if it’s safe or not,” Bell said.