Replica grenade prompts hourlong shutdown of Main Street in Vancouver

A replica grenade found knotted into the end of a sock shut down two blocks of Main Street in Vancouver’s Uptown Village for more than an hour Saturday morning, according to witness reports.

Salmon Creek Outfitters owner Randy Larson, 52, found the object shortly before 10 a.m. while sweeping his storefront. As he swept, he noticed a knotted sock with something in the foot, and he saw the distinctive shell of a grenade through some holes.

“I went to go sweep it onto a plate and noticed the bottom end of the sock was exposed and a little grenade was sticking out of it,” Larson said. “So I immediately went in and called the police, who came pretty rapidly down, closed off the street and took it away.”

Vancouver Police Department responded shortly after 10 a.m. and closed Main Street from 22nd to 24th streets to investigate, according to police spokesperson Kim Kapp. They were joined by a member of the Metropolitan Explosive Disposal Unit, she said.

Police evacuated nearby businesses in response, but by around 11:10 a.m. the bomb squad personnel had arrived and took the suspicious item away, witnesses said. The street was reopened about five minutes later.

Kapp said it is protocol in these situations to secure a potentially explosive device without determining whether it is live or not. Kapp later said the bomb squad determined the grenade was a replica.