Big Island littered with unexploded ordnance

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Hawai'i
HONOLULU ADVERTISER
Big Island littered with unexploded ordnance
By Kevin Dayton
March 1, 2004

HILO, Hawai'i -- Unexploded bombs and shells from long-ago military
training exercises litter huge swaths of the Big Island, from Hilo and
Ka'u to Waimea and North Kohala.

At least nine people have been killed or injured by old artillery rounds
since the 1940s. The abandoned ordnance is a particular threat to
children, who may find the objects and not recognize the dangers they
pose.

Ka'u Paio was digging up a patch of ground for a garden at Waimea Middle
School two years ago when he uncovered a live grenade. Paio, who was
working with picks and shovels with three other students, handled the
grenade before putting it down and telling a teacher. Military ordnance
experts were called to the school and found three more grenades in the
garden plot.

"It was spooky," said Ka'u, now 14.

His grandmother, Mary Paio, said school staff earlier this month asked
her to keep two of her other grandchildren from playing in bushes mauka
of the school for fear they would find more unexploded weapons.

"They are not confident, they're not too sure," she said of the school
staff. "So what is it going to be, leave it until somebody gets hurt?"

Paio, a school bus driver, questions the pace of the military cleanup of
old bombs in Waikoloa and Waimea, particularly in areas frequented by
children.

As part of a five-year, $50 million federal cleanup of the 123,000 acres
known as the Waikoloa Maneuver Area, contractor American Technologies
Inc. this month began using sophisticated equipment to search for
unexploded bombs, shells and grenades, starting with about 340 acres
closest to the developed areas of Waikoloa Village and another 340 acres
in Waimea.

This article can be viewed at:
http://the.honoluluadvertiser.com/article/2004/Mar/01/ln/ln01a.html

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