Phuket's beached torpedo to be detonated with controlled explosion

[snoop1130]

Phuket's beached torpedo to be detonated with controlled explosion

Eakkapop Thongtub

 

 

PHUKET:-- Explosive ordnance experts from the Royal Thai Navy base in Phang Nga this afternoon confirmed that the object found on Nai Yang Beach yesterday (Oct 3) is in fact a torpedo, potentially almost a century old.

 

The Explosive Ordnance Disposal (EOD) team from the Navy base at Tab Lamu along with the EOD team from the Phuket Provincial Police arrived at Nai Yang Beach this afternoon to examine the object, found by a local fisherman.

 

“By carefully inspecting the object, we found that it is a torpedo which may be as old as from before World War II,” said Lieutenant Junior Grade (LTJG) Thanajit Jamjit of the EOD team from the Navy base in Phang Nga.

 

Full Story: https://www.thephuketnews.com/phuket-beached-torpedo-to-be-detonated-with-controlled-explosion-64172.php#ex06ujSj0w6hjX1r.97

 

-- © Copyright Phuket News 2017-10-4

[Psimbo]

Fairly safe after all these years but I wouldn't be stood on top of it with a scraper! Anywhere else in the wold it would be cordoned off- here its selfies. 

 

[kaiyaibob]

Erm WW2 possibly 100 years old???

[Thechook]

Love these EOD experts allowing people to gather around whilst one stands on top and says,  "what happens if I tap here"  

[KhunBENQ]

1 hour ago, kaiyaibob said:

Erm WW2 possibly 100 years old???

 

Quote

may be as old as from before World War II

And WWII started 78 years ago.

 

WWI would fit fine

 

Torpedos exist since the late 19th century or so.

[worgeordie]

That's it,poke it with the digger just to see if would go off !

it's like when the Police years ago,found a parcel bomb,

they were doing a photo shoot with it,as they do,and 

they were crowded around it,and the photographer

said open up the top a bit, BANG !!!,several were killed.

regards worgeordie

[khwaibah]

Who is the moron standing on the torpedo.

 

[phantomfiddler]

13 hours ago, Psimbo said:

Fairly safe after all these years but I wouldn't be stood on top of it with a scraper! Anywhere else in the wold it would be cordoned off- here its selfies. 

 

The torpedo may be "fairly safe", but the explosives inside it are most certainly not. We used to dive on a munitions wreck somewhere off Portland in the British Channel, and it would appear that the shelf life of explosives, even when soaked in seawater for ages, never runs out

[KarenBravo]

I thought it was too small and the wrong size and shape for a torpedo. Looked more like a military jet's drop-tank.

Now that the Navy confirms that it is a torpedo and is ancient, I checked pictures of WWI torpedoes.

As you can see, a WWI US Navy torpedo looks very similar.

 

 

 

[masuk]

31 minutes ago, khwaibah said:

Who is the moron standing on the torpedo.

 

It would matter much if he or the onlookers were all standing on it.  If it went up, so would half the beach.

A few years ago, a group of villagers in Papua New Guinea were taking apart a WWII bomb so they could blast a few fish.

They successfully removed ONE of the fuses before hammering on the casing.

Sadly, the 2nd fuse was still working.

[KarenBravo]

They'll never learn.

Anyone else remember the truck full of detonators (estimated two million, from memory) overturned in Phang Nga.

Villagers swarmed all over the detonators, pillaging them when the whole lot went up.

 

• 15 February 1991: A dynamite truck crashed in Thung Maphrao Subdistrict, Thai Mueang, Phang Nga, resulting in a delayed explosion that killed over 202 people and injured 525, most of them onlookers.

Edited October 5, 2017 by KarenBravo

[Catoni]

Have to be damn careful with old explosives...  In 2008, a guy that collected and restored old U.S. Civil War stuff from the early 1860's was using a power grinder. Sam White, an amateur Civil War buff and artifact restorer, was restoring a 34 kilogram (about 75 lbs) naval cannonball in his driveway, as he did all the time. Sometimes with his wife and son watching. He was under the impression that the shell had been disarmed, and despite his experience, this time he was tragically wrong. Using a grinder to remove rust from the shell, the heat and sparks set off the black powder inside.  Shrapnel struck other houses as far as 400m (400 yards) away, but Sam was the only one killed. About 15 million cannonballs, mortar shells, and artillery shells were fired during the American Civil War that ended when General Robert E. Lee surrendered in 1865 at Appomattox, Virginia.

[Tapster]

Would any historians care to speculate as to where this might have come from?

 

Yes, obviously a submarine!

 

But in what conflict, if any?

Edited October 5, 2017 by Tapster

[Lupatria]

I'm skeptical. Maybe it is a torpedo that missed a boat of Rhingya refugees.

[Psimbo]

11 minutes ago, Tapster said:

Would any historians care to speculate as to where this might have come from?

 

Yes, obviously a submarine!

 

But in what conflict, if any?

There were submarine operations around Phuket in WW2. 27–28 October 1944: The British submarine Trenchant carried two Mk 2 Chariots (nicknamed Tiny and Slasher) to an attack on Phuket harbor in Thailand. See British commando frogmen for more information about this attack. There's an article here  about the chariots being found. https://www.thaivisa.com/forum/topic/73572-two-british-mini-subs-found-off-phuket-coast/

[Psimbo]

19 minutes ago, Tapster said:

Would any historians care to speculate as to where this might have come from?

 

Yes, obviously a submarine!

 

But in what conflict, if any?

There were submarine operations around Phuket in WW2. 27–28 October 1944: The British submarine Trenchant carried two Mk 2 Chariots (nicknamed Tiny and Slasher) to an attack on Phuket harbor in Thailand. See British commando frogmen for more information about this attack. There's an article here  about the chariots being found. https://www.thaivisa.com/forum/topic/73572-two-british-mini-subs-found-off-phuket-coast/

 

There was at last one attack on 'the airfield' as well (which would possibly tie in with the current find) but whether or not that was the current airport I'm not sure- there's bits on the net if you google Phuket WW2'.

Edited October 5, 2017 by Psimbo

[tandor]

 

Erm WW2 possibly 100 years old???

..maybe one of Rocket Man's gone astray..

[Golden Triangle]

There are likely to be a lot more turning up on beaches here once they get their new subs 

[PAIBKK]

They could have sold it as iron to some scrapyard and get some Baht for it. 

Remember April 2014?

 

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/apr/02/second-world-war-bomb-explodes-bangkok

Edited October 5, 2017 by PAIBKK

[nobodysfriend]

20 hours ago, KhunBENQ said:

 

And WWII started 78 years ago.

 

WWI would fit fine

 

Torpedos exist since the late 19th century or so.

Should be put in a museum ...

[IAMHERE]

Looks like scrap metal to me.

 

I am sure munitions from WW1 were used in WW2, at least in the beginning.

[Psimbo]

5 hours ago, PAIBKK said:

They could have sold it as iron to some scrapyard and get some Baht for it. 

Remember April 2014?

 

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/apr/02/second-world-war-bomb-explodes-bangkok

They've moved on since then- about 400 artillery shells were found the other week. http://www.nationmultimedia.com/detail/breakingnews/30327941

[nausea]

The Thais did some damage with torpedoes in the Franco-Siam War c. 1890s. They ran out of torpedoes and some of the military wanted to pack one of the Royal barges with explosive and ram it into a French ship, but the King forbad it.

Edited October 5, 2017 by nausea
More info.

[PETERTHEEATER]

Next stop for EOD is Pattaya beach where, I keep reading, there are many torpedos floating just of the beach in smelly sewage infested seawater. A number of these were the result of  'controlled explosions' after a night on the beer followed by a fiery Moo Phat Phrik By Kapao.

 

Let's hope that the EOD demolition explosions don't spread too much cheer around the beach spectators......

[PETERTHEEATER]

Being serious now and wearing my former RAF Armament Fitter hat and former RAF Bomb Disposal gear I say that it is too small and the wrong shape to be a torpedo as in self-propelled underwater missile. If appears to be a Mk 83 500 pound air dropped bomb of US manufacture of which thousands were imported throught Sattahip port and dropped over Laos, Vietnam and Cambodia by Thai based USAF aircraft. Some will have ended up in the sea. It may even be an inert Practice bomb.

 

The term 'controlled explosion' is EOD speak for the remote use of a small explosive charge positioned to crack or split the bomb casing without detonating the main filling or, at worst, causing a 'low-order' detonation to reduce lateral damage to personnel and structures. In this case, judging from the nonchalant attitude of the assembled masses in the photograph, it can be transported to a remote site and destroyed with a full charge without drama.

[gk10002000]

Christ!  Get away from the damn thing!  They can have an awfully long shelf life.  Cordon off the area and call the EOD folks.

[Dave67]

17 hours ago, khwaibah said:

Who is the moron standing on the torpedo.

 

Stupid F Ker laughing hahahahahah  BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM

[Dave67]